petrichor [rosalie hale]

xxvii. training

Sam shuffled in place a little, keen to just get on with the training before Jacob tried to rip Edward's head off. Edward smirked a little at the image that crossed the leader's mind, before he turned to address the rest of his family.

"They don't trust us enough to be in their human forms," Edward translated for Sam, the wolves lowly grumbling in agreement. Kiara shuffled a little, Paul turning his wolf head and giving her a gentle nudge of encouragement.

"They came. That's what matters," Carlisle replied, noticing how Jacob and Bella were seemingly having a moment. "Will you translate?"

Just as Edward went to say something, the Cullens all found themselves taken a little aback as a few of the wolves started to growl at each other. The large black wolf that they all knew was Sam let out a vicious snarl at them all, and silence fell amongst the pack.

Rosalie watched with slightly furrowed eyebrows as Kiara's ears fell flat against her head, her shoulders slumping a little. She wasn't sure what had been said but the way Edward's cocky smirk had slipped a little told her that it wasn't exactly something nice about them or their family.

Carlisle stepped to the front, his hands tucked in his pockets to show that he was relaxed amongst the wolves. He didn't think they'd hurt him or his family, not when Bella and Kiara's lives were on the line.

"Welcome," he said, his eyes twinkling as he tried to appear friendly to them. "Jasper has experience with newborns. He'll teach us how to defeat them."

'Which one is Jaspar again?' Seth asked, so unsure of the Cullens and who was who. Jared's head turned a little, his eyes flickering over to Kiara as he awaited her to respond to the younger wolf.

'The one with the scars, front right,' Kiara replied, her head titling slightly in his direction.

'Dude looks like he's seen some shit,' Jared replied, trying to diffuse some of the tension that he had created between him and Kiara. The girl ignored him, causing his shoulders to slump a little as he realised that he had really hurt her.

'What's a newborn?' Sam asked, wanting to move this meeting along so that he could get back to Emily. He knew the Cullens weren't going to hurt them, same as Carlisle knew they weren't going to hurt his family, but being around them still made him a little uneasy.

"They want to know how the 'newborns' differ from us," Edward translated, glad that the alpha was trying to stick to the point of the training, rather than allow the wolves to continue to bicker amongst each other. It was amazing to him that they ever managed to achieve anything when they spent so much time arguing.

Carlisle smiled at the question, glad that they were taking an interest in vampire lore.

"They're a great deal stronger than us, because their own human blood lingers in their tissues. Our kind is never more physically powerful than in our first several months of this life," Carlisle explained, making Kiara move between paws with a little unease. 

Riley had only been missing for a short time, and since he was predicted to be involved in whatever army this was, she figured that he was probably lethal enough to cause some serious damage. Sam intercepted her thought, tilting his head to look at her and nodding in agreement. This was much more intense than any of them had realised.

Carlisle nodded to Jasper, allowing the man to take over. Rosalie and Beverly stood behind him, their eyes drifting from their coven brother to the wolves repeatedly. They were trying to gauge all of their reactions but it seemed that they were rather good at holding back emotions while in their wolf forms.

"Carlisle's right. That's why they are created," Jasper explained, flashes of his past coming back to haunt him for a quick second. "A newborn army doesn't need thousands like a human army. And no human army could stand against them."