Moonrise || Harry Potter Twilight Crossover || FanFiction

Chapter Twenty-Four: Bella's POV

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR:

Bella's POV:

Hermione falls asleep in my arms, appearing to have cried herself into exhaustion. After maneuvering her into her bed, under her duvet, I go back to my room and change out of the dress robes, into a pair of comfortable sweats. I take a moment in the bathroom to wipe away the trails of make-up under my eyes, smudged by my tears, and then wipe away the remainders of my lipstick and let out my hair, running my fingers through my hair, untangling and brushing out the remains of my chignon.

I texted Edward to come over, that the flight had been delayed so we'd returned home, and then tried to give myself a pep-talk. "Okay Bella, you can do this." I said, firmly, "Lying to Edward, the love of your life... no big deal." Who the hell was I trying to kid? I was a terrible liar! To be perfectly honest, I was shocked that I'd managed to keep Hermione's secret so long without accidentally revealing something.

I still didn't truly understand it, to be honest, her almost obsession with keeping her secret. With the, I shuddered at the thought of this, newborn army attack approaching, sooner or later she was going to have to reveal the truth. The longer she kept it from them, especially Alice, the more hurt they were going to be. I understood that she was afraid, that she'd almost lost everyone when she'd had to cut off all contact with Charlie and I. I hadn't realized she'd erased her adoptive parents memories of her, but apparently... apparently they didn't even realize she existed anymore.

Her fear of revealing her secret was irrational, but trauma made people irrational. I got that. I did. But eventually the truth would come out, and the best we could do was make sure we controlled how it came out.

The sound of knocking tore me from my thoughts and I took a couple of deep breaths before walking over and opening the door with a smile I hoped didn't look as strained as it felt. "Hi Edward!" I greeted him, but before I could say anything else, though, Edward's golden eyes widened, his nostrils flared, and his lips pulled back over his teeth.

"Edward?" I tried to make my voice sound shocked. I should win an Emmy or something for this performance, "what's wrong?"

"Someone's been here," he growled.

"What do you mean?" I asked, trying to move my expression into one of dread and fear, hoping I wasn't overdoing it.

"A vampire... not one of us." He explained, still growling.

"O-one of the Volturi?" I asked, thinking about what my instinctual response would have been. Edward's face was troubled.

"Have you noticed anything out of place?" He asked, "anything missing?"

"I'm sorry?" I asked, acting confused.

"Things that you'd worn... and touched... and slept on?" Edward prompted.

"Yeah... why? I couldn't find my sweater, before. What's that got to do with a vampire breaking into my house? What is it Edward?" I asked, my voice rising and becoming somewhat hysterical. I was amazing.

"Your visitor... he must have been gathering traces of evidence. To prove that he'd found you." Edward said, fear and frustration clear on his angelic face. I took a deep breath- okay, this was it. Time to sell the idea that the newborn army and Victoria were connected, in some kind of plausible way that sounded like I'd come up with it.

I concentrated on my fear of Riley's revelation- it wasn't hard bringing that to the surface. I let my body stiffen in the very real terror that enveloped me.