I have really come to like Victoria. A lot. I think, perhaps, I might even take up a multi-part story about who she was before she became James' red-eyed cohort. She was human once. And then it changed. And she's got me ridiculously curious as to the story behind it. So I may pick that up soon. Anyway, here's a little oneshot I wrote for the Twilight Challenges Forum, but I ended up finishing it too late, and, as per most of my stories, it morphed into something of its own that stretched outside the limits of the challenge, I believe.

Big thank you to Variety for the beta, and Bloodsucking Leech, I love you! Hang in there, sweetheart.

Without further ado; I present Victoria, in all her glory.

Glittering Shards

'I shouldn't have let him go alone,' I told myself mentally. How many times had I gone over that thought? How many times had I berated myself for being so stupidly fooled? I had followed the scent without even thinking that it wasn't carried by the human… Before, our maneuvers had been flawless. We were a team. Unbeatable. But something had gone wrong this time. I just knew it.

As I saw the plume of purplish smoke looming in the distance, my stomach lurched. Had they won? Had those strange, animal-eaters been able to beat James?

I quickened my pace, knowing even before I rounded the shady corner and saw the smoldering remains of the ballet studio that it was over. Frozen, I just stared at the remaining shambles. There were no walls; it had burned to the ground. Shattered mirrors and glass was strewn out all over the ground, fallen rafters leaned against each other, and a few metal ballet bars were scorched.

Cautiously, cloaked in the shadows of nearby buildings, the plumes of smoke hanging over the building and the waning light of the setting sun, I picked my way through the rubble. I could still smell them all.

The girl, most definitely. Her scent was everywhere. I could smell the boy, and his three comrades. The coven leader had been here too, near the human girl and the boy. Five of the coven had been here. James hadn't stood a chance.

I paused beside the pile of smoldering remains. Before I had arrived, I'd had a feeling. A warning had flooded me as soon as I realized I was going the wrong way when I'd lost the girl's scent. And then… there had been a point where I just… knew. I knew that he was gone, but I had hoped. I'd seen the smoke in the distance, and continued to hope. Then I'd seen the building, and I had become certain he was gone.

Despite this, it was only now when I could smell his lingering scent that I realized the truth.

James was finished.

The feeling was unsettling, disturbing. We'd never lost before. I felt numb from the inside before the sparks of vengeance started to flare.

The flames only began to fan as I turned away from his body and saw one of the few mirrors still standing. It was soot-covered, like everything else, but that wasn't what interested me. A spider-web-like crack fanned out across it, as if something had slammed into it. At the very epicenter, there was blood. Her blood.

I brushed the soot away, and touched my fingertips to the crimson pool. Unable to stop myself, I put my fingertip to my lips, and I tasted her. At the slightest touch, a raw fury ripped through me, exploding into a conflagration.

The smell.

The blood.

Somehow, I knew.

She was still alive.

And because of her, James was not.

I smashed my fist through the mirror, sending a wave of glittering shrapnel fluttering to the ground. Some shards caught my hair, but I didn't care. I stood there, glaring violently at the shattered frame before sweeping my gaze across the mirror-littered floor. The glass pieces glittered up at me, and I stared at my distorted reflection in them.

Her blood lingered on my tongue, and I vowed to taste it again. She would bleed. Slowly. Painfully. And in front of that boy.

The woman reflected back in the mirror shards looked possessed – and perhaps I was. I was riveted with the idea of this girl. This insignificant piece of flesh had cost me the most important thing in my non-life. Why was she so special? Was it the coven that guarded her like one of her own, or was it something about her? She seemed no different than any other.

My eyes were wild with hunger. They lusted for blood, but not for hunger: for revenge. It wouldn't be enough to kill her. I would kill them all. The sparkle of death gleamed out from my eyes.

The smoldering embers framed me, casting my features into sharp relief and accenting the bright, dancing, lively red of my irises. I grinned dangerously; a monster? Was that what I was? Perhaps.

As I turned, the fading sunlight caused some of the shards in my hair, throwing sparkles all over the rubble. I smiled at the irony – for once, it was not because of my skin.

Vengeful. I had always been a creature of bloodlust in the physical sense. I had never minded. With it came power, strength and beauty. I was judge and jury. I could decide who lived and who died. I was the executioner; – the best part – I delivered the death sentences personally.

I was, in all senses of the word, a goddess - beautiful enough to be lusted after, powerful enough to be respected, and temperamental enough to be feared. More cunning than most my kind – I was to be worshipped.

And James had done just that. He had understood the complexities of my cunning and skill and he had worshipped the body they dwelled within.

Fire. I would take them by storm and burn them to ashes. Burn them all for what they did to James. I was merciless. I would kill her first. He could watch. He would know what it was like to lose someone, and then I would kill him too. He wouldn't have long to suffer, unfortunately.

I was flame. My only fuel was the call of blood. Her taste on my lips spurred my want. My time was limited – this I knew. Driven by a lust that would fade with the conquest, I was going to be a raw fire.

I would consume them all. Once my fuel expired – as it would – I wasn't sure what would happen. Would I extinguish myself? Or would I continue to burn slowly, the shine gradually fading? Either way, the height and magnificence of my glory would be finished when the human was. Shattered. Like the mirrors around me.

I was lethal. I watched as my eyes narrowed at the shards around me. I was more than lethal, however that may be.

I turned again, a little faster this time, feeling a sense of urgency grip me. Again – small rainbows flashed around me as I turned, the moonlight becoming stronger with the dying sun.

I was beautiful. As the moonlight filtered in from closer to overhead, it danced off the thousands of mirror shards – both on the ground and in my hair - lighting up the empty space like a grand ballroom of decaying corpses.

I had never imagined that James and I would be temporary - that a match so perfectly created could eventually cease to exist. As if, beneath the flawless, shimmering beauty, there was an ephemeral clock ticking.

Like a mirror, in a way. Beautiful, smooth, flawless, reflecting light and beauty and any image we wished to portray – and yet apparently able to come shattering down with a swift, single blow.

Perhaps we were all mirrors.

We could choose what we wanted to show. James and I chose power and stealth, mercilessness and selfishness. There was nothing left to give in a world that had taken everything from us.

For the others, their mirrors were illusions; they tried to show that they weren't shimmering aberrations of existence. They tried to be human. Behind that, though, they were no more human than James and I.

They were all such fools, messing with a balanced team such as ours. I was skillful. And I was strong. No one ever beat us. They should've just let James win. Then it would have just been her.

But now, their careful façade of humanity would be shattered into a thousand tiny pieces – not unlike the rainbow-casting mirrors around the room. It couldn't be just her now. Not after this injustice to our perfection.

I had been beautiful, seductress, enchanting, bewitching, ruthless, violent, and passionate; I had even been lover. But now, I would play a role I had never thought I'd need to play – I would be an avenging angel.

I turned again, more rainbows were thrown around. I would shatter their prism-like world into a thousand shards for retribution.

A twinkle across the room caught my eye, and I looked in the direction on James' ashes. His remains were mixed with faint, glittering pieces of glass, twinkling out at me, as if he, too, were impatient for me to begin my hunt.

I smiled across the room at the dwindling violet smoke.

Soon, I promised him. Soon.