Midnight Sun (The Twilight Saga #5) - Stephenie Meyer Page 0,209

wondered if this would sound real to her at all. This was irrelevant history, set in a country she’d never seen, separated from her own existence by so many years that she had no context for it.

She seemed spellbound, though, as I described the attack that had infected Carlisle and killed his associates, carefully leaving out the details I’d rather she didn’t dwell on. When the vampire, driven by thirst, had wheeled around and fallen on his pursuers, he’d only slashed Carlisle twice with his venom-covered teeth: once across the palm of his outstretched hand, and once through his bicep. It had been a melee, the vampire struggling to quickly subdue four men before the rest of the mob got too close. After the fact, Carlisle had theorized that the vampire was hoping to drain them all, but he chose self-preservation over a more bounteous meal, grabbing the men he could carry and running. It was not self-preservation from the mob, of course; those fifty men with their crude weapons were no more dangerous to him than a kaleidoscope of butterflies. However, the Volturi were less than a thousand miles away. Their laws had been established for a millennium by this point, and their demand that every immortal exercise discretion for the benefit of all was universally accepted. The story of a vampire sighting in London, attested to by fifty witnesses with drained corpses as proof, would not have gone over well in Volterra.

The nature of Carlisle’s wounds was unfortunate. The gash in his hand was far from any major vessels, the slash in his arm had missed both the brachial artery and the basilic vein. This meant a much slower spread of the venom, and a longer transition period. As the conversion from mortal to immortal was the most painful thing any of us had ever experienced, an extended version was not ideal, to say the least.

I’d known the pain of that same extended version. Carlisle had been… unsure when he decided to change me into his first companion. He’d spent a great deal of time with other, more experienced vampires—the Volturi included—and he knew that a better placed bite would result in a quicker conversion. However, he’d never found another vampire like himself. All the others were obsessed with blood and power. No one else craved a kinder, more familial life as he did. He wondered whether his slow conversion and the weak entry points of his infection had been somehow responsible for the difference. So when creating his first son, he chose to imitate his own wounds. He’d always felt bad about that, especially as he later found that the method of conversion actually had no bearing on the personality and desires of the new immortal.

He hadn’t had time to experiment when he found Esme. She was much closer to death than I had been. To save her, it had been imperative to get as much venom into her system as close to her heart as possible. All in all, a much more frenzied effort than it had been with me—and yet Esme was the gentlest of us all.

And Carlisle the strongest. I now told Bella what I could about his extraordinarily disciplined conversion. I found myself editing things that perhaps I shouldn’t have, but I didn’t want to dwell on Carlisle’s excruciating pain. Maybe, given her obvious curiosity about the process, it would have been a good thing to describe; perhaps it would have deterred her from wanting to know more.

“It was over then,” I explained, “and he realized what he had become.”

All the while, lost in my own thoughts as I told the familiar tale, I’d been observing her reactions. For the most part, she kept the same expression fixed on her face; I think she meant it to look like attentive interest, totally devoid of any unnecessary emotional recoils. However, she held herself too stiffly for her ploy to be believable. Her curiosity was real, but I wanted to know what she really thought, not what she wanted me to think she thought.

“How are you feeling?” I asked.

“I’m fine,” she answered automatically. But her mask slipped a little bit. Still, all I could read on her face was a desire to know more. So this story hadn’t been enough to frighten her away.

“I expect you have a few more questions for me.”

She grinned, totally self-possessed, seemingly fearless. “A few.”

I smiled back. “Come on, then, I’ll show you.”

20. CARLISLE

WE WALKED BACK ALONG THE HALL TO