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PROBLEMS, PROBLEMS,
AND MORE PROBLEMS
"HE'S GOT THE PLACE SURROUNDED AND HE'LL WAIT FOR HIS OPPORTUNITY."
"A war against the wolves? Well that's just fucking fantastic."
When Augustine, Alice, and Jasper filed back into the house, Jacob was already inside giving the family a heads up on what was about to occur. Paul's message was correct, it seemed: it was really going down.
"We won't get through without a fight," Emmett interjected, arms crossed over his chest.
"No fights," Carlisle said, "we won't be the ones to break the treaty."
Augustine was pretty sure the treaty was already broken, given that if Sam was going to have the home surrounded, there was no shot they were going to be standing around in their human forms. No, they'd be shifted on Olympic lands.
She was happy Jacob was thinking the same thing. "The treaty is void, at least in Sam's mind."
"Carlisle," Emmett called out, stepping forward from beside his spot next to the smaller ravenette. "No one's hunted for weeks."
It was then that Augustine noticed the subtle brown of everyone's eyes, indicative that they weren't quite starving yet, but they were hungry. "I could help with that—" Augustine raised her hand, watching Carlisle's eye as she pointed to the pillows that littered a loveseat nearby. "As long as you don't mind me turning our pillows into food."
"We'll make do," Esme responded, though she did give the girl a soft nod.
Carlisle's attention flickered back to the shifter. "Thank you Jacob, you've done us a great service."
Augustine glanced outside, seeing the sun begin to dip past the looming pine trees, and knew that whatever the wolves were plotting was going to happen sooner than later. Even if they didn't attack tonight, knowing that the Cullens would be on guard, the vampires were still just sitting ducks.
When Jacob moved to leave the room, Augustine pushed away from her place near Emmett and called out to him. "Can I talk to you for a sec, Jacob?"
Though the shifter seemed bewildered by her request, he gestured his head to make her follow him. Giving Emmett a reassuring squeeze, she followed the boy out of the home until they reached the back porch.
She leaned against the wooden railing and looked at him. "Paul's definitely on team Sam, right?" she questioned, despite already knowing the answer from her phone call with him— otherwise, he would've been here alongside Jacob, and Seth and Leah Clearwater who were lurking around the perimeter.
"No one can hurt you, Augustine," was his response, not outright saying the obvious about Paul's choice of leadership. "It's against our most sacred laws— and even if you tried to leave, the worst they could do was try and stop you."
The ravenette nodded, more to herself than to Jacob. There goes her window of opportunity to collect food for her family and bring it back; she'd be stopped by the wolves before she even made it past the treeline. She'd have to use her abilities, ones she hadn't properly used since the night she gave herself her hand back.
"I know Bella means a lot to you," she started, nervously wrapping her arms around her torso at the way his stance went rigid. "But she means a lot to me, too... so, temporary truce?"
Augustine never particularly liked Jacob, but for Bella's sake, she would try. She watched him revel in her words, before he begrudgingly sighed and put his hand forward. "Truce."
She shook his hand, a lighter feeling in her chest. As long as they worked together, no harm would come to the human girl.
At least she hoped.
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The first night passed without the wolves doing anything other than lurk by the trees, and even after a few days of this, distant growls and howls were a normal sound throughout the air.
When Augustine failed to show up to the Lahote residence, she got a frenzy of phone calls the following morning from the boy— all of which she declined. However, she wasn't heartless, so of course she opted to text him back in response.
"CAN'T TALK, BUSY W/ BELLA."
And it was followed by a single text back.
"ARE YOU SAFE?"
Now that was obviously code for: has it been born yet, and if so, has she kicked the bucket?
"YOU GUYS OWE ME SO MUCH FOOD ONCE THIS IS OVER. BUT YEAH. ARE YOU?"
"YEAH."
The eyes of the vampires within the home began to blacken, almost drastically. Due to this progression of collective hunger, Augustine was put to the test.
Carlisle's hands were on her shoulders, watching her second failed attempt at manipulating one of the pillows in his office into a woodland creature. She envisioned a deer in her mind, something large enough to curb her family's acute starvation just until she could conjure up some more.
But, for some reason, nothing was happening. There was no tingly feeling in her fingertips or palms, and by the third attempt of visualizing a deer in her mind, her stomach roared to life.
"I can't do this, Carlisle," she whined, frustration growing alongside her own hunger as she tossed the pillow across his office.
Did restoring her hand suck up all the power of her abilities? Could she no longer manipulate living matter as a result?
She was lost, and her mind drifted to her penpal who she thought would have some answers... if only he hadn't stopped sending her anything following their confrontation. Plus, she needed a solution now, not in three days— if he would even send a response back.
"You can, August," he reassured her, a small smile on his face as he went to pick up the disregarded pillow from off the floor. He handed it to her once more, "here, try one more time and then if nothing happens, we leave it alone for today, okay?"
"Okay," she conceded, gripping the pillow in her hands with much more conviction than before.
If she failed, her entire family would likely go feral before the wolves even thought of fully breaching the home to get to Bella. No, she couldn't let it happen— she wouldn't.
Only, when she tried this next time, she was overcome with a wave of fatigue. She tried blinking it from her eyes, but the way she staggered back by an inch made alarm bells ring in the blond man's head. "Honey, what's wrong?" he asked, immediately going to her side to support her weight.
She shook her head. "I'm fine, let me try just one more time," she shrugged him away, looking to her now empty hands. There was no deer, no pillow, no nothing. "I don't understand what I—" Her eyelids drooped violently, and her body crumpled to the ground within a split second.
Except this time, there was no bed to catch her fall and no reinstated hand to smile about as she went.
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The minute Carlisle walked into the living room with an unconscious Augustine in his arms, the room descended into chaos and the football game on the television had long been abandoned.
"What the hell?" Emmett was up on his feet in an instant, crowding in the man's space as the others on the couch opposite of the one Bella was occupying stood to free up space. "What happened in there?!"
Even Esme seemed to rush forward, observing the scene with sad eyes. "What's wrong with her, Carlisle?"
Carlisle set her down, eyebrows furrowed in an anxiousness that was rare to see so freely on his face. "We were practicing when she got tired... it seems like she's fainted."
"We can't get tired, Carlisle, and we sure as shit can't just pass out," Emmett argued, and even the comforting hand on his bicep that belonged to Rosalie wasn't enough to calm him. "You must've pushed her too hard!"
"Emmett..." Rosalie tried, attempting to pull him back from getting in Carlisle's face. Tensions were already heightened due to everyone's hunger, and this was evidently setting Emmett off even more.
"I'm going to see what I can find out," Carlisle reassured the stocky vampire who quite literally looked like he was about to have a conniption. "In the mean time, maybe we—"
A sudden retching noise sounded around them, and it made Edward dive to reach for a plastic bucket nearby for Bella to empty her stomach contents into.
The sigh of sheer discontent that escaped Emmett could've been comical, if the circumstances were far different from what they actually were.
He took a seat on the floor and leaned against the couch that housed Augustine's unmoving body, almost acting like a shield between the unconscious girl and the vomit-fest happening just feet away.
"So many fucking problems."
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[ wyn's note ]
something's wrong with august.... ruh roh....
thanks a bunch for 80k reads you guys!! hope you enjoyed the update :)
all love xx