I scowled.

He touched my pouting lower lip and smiled. “Besides, it’s unnecessary. The Volturi will stop. They will be made to understand.”

“But if they don’t! I need to learn this.”

“Find another teacher.”

That was not our last conversation on the subject, but I never swayed him an inch from his decision.

Emmett was more than willing to help, though his teaching felt to me a lot like revenge for all the lost arm-wrestling matches. If I could still bruise, I would have been purple from head to toe. Rose, Tanya, and Eleazar all were patient and supportive. Their lessons reminded me of Jasper’s fighting instructions to the others last June, though those memories were fuzzy and indistinct. Some of the visitors found my education entertaining, and some even offered assistance. The nomad Garrett took a few turns—he was a surprisingly good teacher; he interacted so easily with others in general that I wondered how he’d never found a coven. I even fought once with Zafrina while Renesmee watched from Jacob’s arms. I learned several tricks, but I never asked for her help again. In truth, though I liked Zafrina very much and I knew she wouldn’t really hurt me, the wild woman scared me to death.

I learned many things from my teachers, but I had the sense that my knowledge was still impossibly basic. I had no idea how many seconds I would last against Alec and Jane. I only prayed that it would be long enough to help.

Every minute of the day that I wasn’t with Renesmee or learning to fight, I was in the backyard working with Kate, trying to push my internal shield outside of my own brain to protect someone else. Edward encouraged me in this training. I knew he hoped I would find a way of contributing that satisfied me while also keeping me out of the line of fire.

It was just so hard. There was nothing to get a hold of, nothing solid to work with. I had only my raging desire to be of use, to be able to keep Edward, Renesmee, and as much of my family as possible safe with me. Over and over I tried to force the nebulous shield outside of myself, with only faint, sporadic success. It felt like I was wrestling to stretch an invisible rubber band—a band that would change from concrete tangibility into insubstantial smoke at any random moment.

Only Edward was willing to be our guinea pig—to receive shock after shock from Kate while I grappled incompetently with the insides of my head. We worked for hours at a time, and I felt like I should be covered in sweat from the exertion, but of course my perfect body didn’t betray me that way. My weariness was all mental.

It killed me that it was Edward who had to suffer, my arms wrapped uselessly around him while he winced over and over from Kate’s “low” setting. I tried as hard as I could to push my shield around us both; every now and then I would get it, and then it would slip away again.

I hated this practice, and I wished that Zafrina would help instead of Kate. Then all Edward would have to do was look at Zafrina’s illusions until I could stop him from seeing them. But Kate insisted that I needed better motivation—by which she meant my hatred of watching Edward’s pain. I was beginning to doubt her assertion from the first day we’d met—that she wasn’t sadistic about the use of her gift. She seemed to be enjoying herself to me.

“Hey,” Edward said cheerfully, trying to hide any evidence of distress in his voice. Anything to keep me from fighting practice. “That one barely stung. Good job, Bella.”

I took a deep breath, trying to grasp exactly what I’d done right. I tested the elastic band, struggling to force it to remain solid as I stretched it away from me.

“Again, Kate,” I grunted through my clenched teeth.

Kate pressed her palm to Edward’s shoulder.

He sighed in relief. “Nothing that time.”

She raised an eyebrow. “That wasn’t low, either.”

“Good,” I huffed.

“Get ready,” she told me, and reached out to Edward again.

This time he shuddered, and a low breath hissed between his teeth.

“Sorry! Sorry! Sorry!” I chanted, biting my lip. Why couldn’t I get this right?

“You’re doing an amazing job, Bella,” Edward said, pulling me tight against him. “You’ve really only been working at this for a few days and you’re already projecting sporadically. Kate, tell her how well she’s doing.”

Kate pursed her lips. “I don’t know. She’s obviously got tremendous ability, and we’re only beginning to touch it. She can do better, I’m sure. She’s just lacking incentive.”

I stared at her in disbelief, my lips automatically curling back from my teeth. How could she think I lacked motivation with her shocking Edward right here in front of me?

I heard murmurs from the audience that had grown steadily as I practiced—only Eleazar, Carmen, and Tanya at first, but then Garrett had wandered over, then Benjamin and Tia, Siobhan and Maggie, and now even Alistair was peering down from a window on the third story. The spectators agreed with Edward; they thought I was already doing well.

“Kate…,” Edward said in a warning voice as some new course of action occurred to her, but she was already in motion. She darted along the curve of the river to where Zafrina, Senna, and Renesmee were walking slowly, Renesmee’s hand in Zafrina’s as they traded pictures back and forth. Jacob shadowed them from a few feet behind.

“Nessie,” Kate said—the newcomers had quickly picked up the irritating nickname, “would you like to come help your mother?”

“No,” I half-snarled.

Edward hugged me reassuringly. I shook him off just as Renesmee flitted across the yard to me, with Kate, Zafrina, and Senna right behind her.

“Absolutely not, Kate,” I hissed.

Renesmee reached for me, and I opened my arms automatically. She curled into me, pressing her head into the hollow beneath my shoulder.

“But Momma, I want to help,” she said in a determined voice. Her hand rested against my neck, reinforcing her desire with images of the two of us together, a team.

“No,” I said, quickly backing away. Kate had taken a deliberate step in my direction, her hand stretched toward us.

“Stay away from us, Kate,” I warned her.

“No.” She began stalking forward. She smiled like a hunter cornering her prey.

I shifted Renesmee so that she was clinging to my back, still backing away at a pace that matched Kate’s. Now my hands were free, and if Kate wanted to keep her hands attached to her wrists, she’d better keep her distance.

Kate probably didn’t understand, never having known for herself the passion of a mother for her child. She must not have realized just how far past too far she’d already gone. I was so furious that my vision took on a strange reddish tint, and my tongue tasted like burning metal. The strength I usually worked to keep restrained flowed through my muscles, and I knew I could crush her into diamond-hard rubble if she pushed me to it.

The rage brought every aspect of my being into sharper focus. I could even feel the elasticity of my shield more exactly now—feel that it was not a band so much as a layer, a thin film that covered me from head to toe. With the anger rippling through my body, I had a better sense of it, a tighter hold on it. I stretched it around myself, out from myself, swaddling Renesmee completely inside it, just in case Kate got past my guard.

Kate took another calculated step forward, and a vicious snarl ripped up my throat and through my clenched teeth.

“Be careful, Kate,” Edward cautioned.

Kate took another step, and then made a mistake even someone as inexpert as I could recognize. Just a short leap away from me, she looked away, turning her attention from me to Edward.

Renesmee was secure on my back; I coiled to spring.

“Can you hear anything from Nessie?” Kate asked him, her voice calm and easy.