EPILOGUE
"How come Winny can go barefoot and I couldn't? Bella demanded and she, Alice, and Rosalie sat around putting together last minute details for the youngest Swan's wedding. It had been so long since either Bella or Alice had seen Winny, Rose took trips biannually to see Winny in Italy, and Renesmee was nearly grown now. As was Rosalie's daughter Vera (Vera's full name was Winifred Vera McCarty but when the entire family got together, Winny included, it began to get confusing).
"I mean I was a notoriously clumsy human and Winny is not only the picture of grace , but a vampire." Bella's bitter statement was actually quite true. As it had her sister, immortality became Winny beautifully and the splendor that Aro showered her in only made the change that more obvious. Last time Charlie had been around and showed Bella a picture of Winny, her sister had been beautiful on the beach with her arms wrapped around Felix and Aro, both of whom she had convinced to pop in brown contacts.
"Winny wants a night time beach wedding in Italy. For her venue it would be stupid to try to put her in shoes because the sand would ruin them. Your wedding was behind the house and you had a solid aisle to walk on," Alice answered instantly, having heard Bella's same complaint three times already.
The tall brunette sighed and leaned back against her chair. Clearly she was unhappy with the development, not only was her sister immortal but she was also clearly happy in all the pictures Charlie and Rosalie showed Bella. To Bella, it wasn't fair that Winny had all that and more without a fight at all, and Bella had needed to work for everything she had.
So the planning continued in silence.
*********
"Aunt Winny!" Two young voices called out happily as Winny stepped off the plane, Felix right behind her. Winny was instantly able to see Renesmee and Vera darting across the tarmac towards her so she flew down the rest of the stairs and held her arms open for her nieces to run into.
"Hello pretties," Winny cooed as she folded the both of them into her arms for a bear hug that would put one of Emmett's to shame. When she pulled back, "Goodness you're both taller than I am now!"
Renesmee and Vera giggled at the development and Winny's grin got even bigger at the scent of her three favorite wolves.
Out of the shadows of another plane, the same shadow Vera and Nessie had leapt from earlier, Seth, Embry, and Jacob all emerged.
"Boys!" Winny cooed and the girls in her arms were only too happy to involve the three pack members into their group hug. "I haven't seen you in years! None of you have aged a day!"
Felix watched from the door of the plane as the future Volturi leader spoke to her friends like they hadn't just gotten done talking about her role change after her wedding.
*********
"Daddy!" Winny ran at her aging father and stepmother at a very human pace. "Sue!"
Behind her, Renesmee and Vera only giggled as they watched their favorite aunt (not that either of them would admit their favoritism to the vampire women back at their house) take her father and surrogate mother up into a hug just like the one she had taken them into last night. Sue looked ecstatic, not letting Winny's frozen skin faze her, and Charlie looked unbelievably awkward. Winny had been gone for years, and Bella sure hadn't been giving her father any affection.
"I missed you both so much!" Winny's eyes shone with happy tears that wouldn't fall as she pulled away and gave her father some room to breath again. "How are you both?"
Charlie gave his daughter, who he hadn't seen since she last flew out to be a bridesmaid at his wedding to Sue, a happy grin. Sue was practically beaming at the girl who had only gotten more beautiful since the last time Sue had seen her. Winny's eyes had settled into a honey gold color long ago, but just like she had last time, both Winny and her Volturi companion were wearing colored contacts. They both were displaying pairs of beautiful calf brown eyes, a color that was a close match to what Winny had before.
"We've never been happier," Charlie sighed in contentment as his wife took his hand and leaned her head on his shoulder. Sue nodded in agreement to her husband's words.
"Charlie's been close to heaven ever since he got his Christmas gift," Sue smiled knowingly, her eyes going to the garage where Charlie had stored his present in preparation for leaving. "He's hardly been off the water since he learned how to use that GPS thing."
Winny grinned. She'd gotten her father a top of the line boat for Christmas the year before, which he'd protested without much conviction, and a fish finder for when he and Billy went on their weekend fishing trips. It was in accordance to the set of new poles and bait her sister and Edward had gotten him.
"Glad you finally warmed up to it," Winny teased as she was lead into her childhood home, her nieces and their imprints hot on her heels.
**********
"Hey Embry," Winny smiled, finally collapsing next to her imprint after a long day at her father's house. The two of them were in Embry's small house, just passed the treaty line where Embry had moved a few years ago before her last visit. "How's Alistair?"
Alistair was the other reason Embry had moved off of pack lands, with the permission of both his alpha and Carlisle. About two years after the Cullen's stand off with the Volturi over Renesmee, Alistair had been passing through and Embry had been the wolf to make sure he wasn't going to be a threat. The way Alistair told it Embry jumped him, ruining his jacket, and shifted back into his human form. At that point Embry would always cut his boyfriend off and claim Alistair had been knocked silly at the sight of his amazing abs and Alistair would scoff and say that was hardly the most impressive part of Embry's body. Long story short, after he had made sure Alistair wasn't a threat, Embry had smiled his goofy grin and asked the english vampire out for coffee.
At the sound if his mate's name, Embry smiled happily.
"Out hunting with Jasper. Sometimes he still has some difficulties with the bunny diet and he has to feed more often than the rest of the Cullens."
Winny smiled too, seeing her best male friend so happy.
"He's doing really well and I know we're all proud of him." Embry continued before he sighed, and hefted himself to his feet. "Want me to lead you to the room you won't use?"
Winny grinned and stood up, nodding.
"Yeah. For some reason, just laying down and vegging out to some infomercials sounds really appealing right now.
Embry laughed and led her down the hall, passed their son's room and to the one that was permanently hers.
********
Felix was uncomfortable to say the least, staying at the Cullen's house. His hands were tied though as his discomfort was put to the side in favor of letting his friend spend some time with her human family. Her imprint was gay, and she was marrying another man, her mate, so she wanted to spend some time with her imprint and their son who Embry was raising with his mate. Honestly sometimes even Felix had a hard time wrapping his head around it, but just looking at the strange little family it was obvious that Winny's mate had nothing to worry about. Winny and Embry's relationship was clearly platonic.
There was another bump downstairs and Felix heard one of Winny's nieces, it sounded like Vera, swear. Then Alice added her bird like soprano. Felix sighed and closed his eyes, trying to block out the noise.
********
The plane touched down and instantly, Vera, Renesmee and Harry were all at the window looking out at Italy, not caring at all that it was almost too dark to see. Someone roused Sue and Charlie, probably one of the pack members, but Winny took no notice as she flew off the plane and into the arms of her husband to be.
"Marcus," Winny sighed in content as she buried her face in the man's neck. "I missed you."
Marcus' face slid into a small, comfortable smile as he held Winny in his arms.
"I missed you too, lovely."
*******
Winny stood at the beginning of forever, looking her mate in the eyes over the heads of their closest friends and family. And as she stood there waiting for the wedding march to start, she couldn't help but remember how they had gotten there.
Winny had been changed almost as soon as she landed in Italy. She'd had just enough time to call and tell her father she'd be disconnected until she got a new phone, and then she was bitten.
Everything had been just as she'd expected for almost a year after her transition. She studied, worked on her self control, trained her body as well as her mind, and she kept in touch with her family back home. She hadn't even crossed Marcus's path until she found herself in the library one day and had seen him scaling a bookshelf to get one at the top. The sight, that of a respected Volturi leader climbing one of Aro's precocious bookcases like a spider monkey, had been so shocking she hadn't been able to keep in her snort of amusement. Marcus had whipped around, seen her, and then dropped to the floor with the book he'd been reaching for in hand.
"Is there something funny, Winifred?" He'd asked her formally, blank faced. She'd shaken her head and they had parted. It was months later before they met again, this time Aro had been short staffed so he'd sent Marcus out with her to hunt.
Marcus had looked rather put out at the prospect of babysitting the newborn, but he had gone along with it anyway, probably having nothing better to do with his eternity.
"This should be over pretty quick," Winny had assured him as the two of them came to a stop at the beginning of her usual hunting ground. "If you want, there's a town about five minutes that way if you're hungry too."
Marcus had later told her that until then, no one had ever made him feel human about eating.
He had shaken his head then, and Winny had taken that to mean she could go have her fill then. She fed and Marcus watched. Then the two of them had returned to their home in silence. The next time Winny needed to feed, Aro was delighted when Marcus came and asked to accompany her again. Winny hadn't been in the room but Jane had told her about it later.
And so it became their routine. Winny and Marcus would hunt every other week. No one even noticed that Marcus' eyes had begun to lighten, not even Winny. Aro only noticed after Marcus had declined another of Heidi's feasts. Again, Winny had heard from Jane, but Aro had gotten a satisfied smile and left the matter alone. At the end of Winny's second year with the Volturi, Marcus' eyes were fully golden.
Things had just progressed from there. Marcus began to speak to Winny on their hunts, theirs because Marcus was clearly feeding as well. His face began to show emotion and most surprising was when he insisted accompanying her back to Forks, when she felt she had control of her thirst. Aro had granted her a visit and had publicly asked the guard if anyone wished to volunteer to go with her. Marcus had.
*********
Winny returned from her thoughts as she came to a stop in front of the man she loved. She'd been so lost she hadn't even felt her father take her arm to lead her, but when she came back to herself she gave him a grateful smile. Charlie had tears in his eyes.
"Take good care of her, Marcus," Charlie said gruffly before he sat down next to Sue. Aro cleared his throat.
"Dear ones," Aro blinked his blue eyes, showing the contacts he had indulgently doned at Winny's request, "We are gathered here today to join this man and this woman in holy matrimony.
"I have been alive for what feels like a very long time, and have known Marcus with and without our dear Winifred. As their friends I can easily say that I have never seen Marcus so happy as he is with Winny Swan. It is because this that I am able to stand here before you with great satisfaction as I help the two of them start the rest of their forever." From their places as part of the wedding party, Alice, Embry, Renesmee, Rosalie, Vera, Seth, Leah, Caius and Jake were all beaming.
Aro nodded at Marcus.
"Winny, I met you at a dark time in my life and before you, I wasn't sure how I was going to make it. Now, I'm glad for every day that I grit my teeth and bore it because as Aro said, I've never felt happier. Before we met, I was as lost as a person could be and yet you saw something in me that gave my life direction again. I could fill a library with the things I love about you, but for the sake of starting our lives together as soon as possible I'll say three. Winifred Swan, you are sacrificing, you are understanding, you are beautiful, and every day that I am with you I love you a little more. I can't wait for tomorrow, and for forever, because I know it will only get better."
Winny's eyes were glassy as she looked up at Marcus, and her smile was so radiant that people in the back were being blinded by it. It would be obvious to a blind person that Marcus and Winny were in love.
"Marcus, I wasn't looking for love when I went to Italy. Adventure, yes. Gelato, also yes," there were some chuckles around the tent. "When I met you in that library, scaling the bookshelves so that you could reach the volume you wanted I didn't expect anything to come out of it. And now that I look back on that moment I was seeing you for that perfect, flawless human being that I had made you out to be in my head. I think that was why when I discovered I loved you, it hit me like a freight train. I look at my father, and his love for Sue, Bella and her love for Edward, and Rose and her love for Emmett and I realize true love is falling in love over and over again every day. So even if it means getting hit by a million hypothetical trains, I want to spend the rest of my existence with you."
There was a beat of silence before Aro grinned giddily and motioned for Rosalie and Caius to hand Winny and Marcus the rings.
"Winny, do you promise to love Marcus for the rest of your life?" Aro asked, and Winny's throat tightened to the point she could only nod. Aro turned to Marcus.
"Marcus, do you promise to cherish and protect Winny until the end of your days?"
Marcus met Winny's eyes.
"I do," he promised solemnly.
Aro's grin was reaching Cheshire proportions as the two of them slid the silver bands onto each other's fingers and he clapped like a happy child.
"Then it is the greatest honor of my life to pronounce the two of you husband and wife. You may kiss-"
Marcus beat Aro the the punch line and he swept Winny into his strong arms and kissed her like it was the last thing he was ever going to do. Everyone watching stood up and clapped.