Leah Clearwater

Leah Clearwater is the daughter of Harry Clearwater and Sue Clearwater. She is Seth Clearwater's older sister, Sam Uley's ex-girlfriend, and the only known female shape-shifter. She phased into a wolf during the events of New Moon, around the same time as her brother, Seth. She also has deeply unsettled issues (including a broken heart) and is overprotective of her little brother.

New Moon and Eclipse
Leah and her brother Seth phase into wolves for the first time during the events of New Moon, though this is not revealed until Eclipse. Earlier in New Moon, Bella describes meeting her at a pasta party at Jacob's house. However, Leah spends the evening on the phone. It is believed that the shock of Leah and Seth's transformations caused their father, Harry, to suffer a fatal heart attack. Leah's transformation causes her further pain because she is forcefully linked with Sam mentally on a daily basis, who caused her heartbreak when he abandoned her for her cousin, Emily Young. She deliberately uses this forced mental connection to punish Sam and the pack both with her memories of the torment and by bringing up uncomfortable subjects (such as Embry Call's parentage), all things the pack would rather forget. Jacob once described her as a "harpy", which she took as an offence.

During their fight with Victoria's newborn army, she tries to prove herself as worthy as the rest of her pack by fighting a newborn vampire alone. Jacob manages to knock her out of the way before the vampire crushed the bones on his right side.

After the army was destroyed, Bella rejects Jacob's feelings over Edward. A few weeks later, Leah starts pestering Jacob to make him get over Bella, until he disappears into the woods to live as a wolf and escape the emotional pain.

Breaking Dawn
After Bella married Edward, she became pregnant with their daughter, Renesmee. After finding out, Sam decides to lead an unprovoked attack onto the Cullens to kill Bella and the unknown baby. Jacob, however, refused to follow Sam and broke away from the pack to create his own, and was soon followed by Seth. Despite her dislike towards vampires, Leah joins them and helps to protect the Cullens with the excuse of protecting her brother, but her real motive was to get away from Sam. Her choice apparently hurts Sam so he sends a messenger in the hopes of persuading both her and Seth to come back to the pack. Leah had already made up her mind to stay in Jacob's pack until she can stop being a wolf. Despite the initial antagonism between the two of them, they soon form a closer bond due to their broken hearts. She and Jacob have a deep conversation one day whilst hunting, mentioning how being frozen in time has stopped her menstruation cycle and may have disabled her ability to get pregnant. Jacob also remembers her breakdown when she first became a wolf, thinking herself as a freak, a "girly wolf". Leah also wondered if she maybe wasn't as feminine as she thought she was, and wondered how imprinting would be for her. It is in this discussion with Jacob that Leah mentions how she can relate to Rosalie and the idea of never having a child from her own body was upsetting.

She is so loyal to Jacob that she goes as far as to confront Bella about her unintentionally tormenting him. Bella is very hurt by this incident and Jacob commands Leah to stop, even though he does not enforce it in his unbreakable "Alpha-voice", as Edward would have liked him to. She does not enjoy spending time around the vampires, but does so out of loyalty to her new pack. After Leah and Seth join Jacob's pack, he names her as his Beta or second-in-command. Leah becomes a much happier person after she leaves Sam's pack because she won't have to be connected to him anymore.

Leah, along with the rest of the werewolves, stand with the Cullens when the Volturi arrive. Their numbers and Bella's talent succeeds in repelling the Volturi without a fight. Stephanie Meyer has affirmed that if she was to make another chapter of the Twilight Saga, Leah might be the character whose perspective is used.

Sam Uley
Leah and Sam dated in high school and they cared about each other very much, even though Sam could not tell her that he was a wolf. Their relationship ended when Leah brought her cousin Emily for a visit, and Sam imprinted on her after one look. After Leah turned into a werewolf, she is forced to endure hearing Sam's never-ending thoughts about Emily. This, coupled with the fact that she was then informed about imprinting (something Sam was forbidden to tell her about when he broke up with her), made her very bitter and caused her to take her pain and anger out on the pack since. Another reason why she likes to lash out is that the rest of the wolves can read her thoughts and know that she is still pining after Sam. Although she acts as if she hates Sam, she wants the very best for him. Despite the fact that he cannot be with her and feels bad whenever he sees her, the series says Sam is still in love with Leah. He is deeply upset and hurt when Leah leaves to join Jacob's pack, and so sends Jared to ask her to come back by telling him to get on his knees and beg, to do anything to convince her to rejoin his pack; even calling her "Lee-Lee", Sam's nickname for her from when they were dating.



Seth Clearwater
Seth is Leah's little brother. She is very protective of him as seen in Breaking Dawn when she joins Jacob's pack in order to keep an eye on Seth and protect him. She idolizes him for being more understanding and friendly than she is. They seem to have a loving, normal brother-sister relationship where they tease each other, such as when Seth said he would mind if Jacob killed Leah after pretending to think about it. Seth is much younger than Leah.



Jacob Black
"Am I less annoying than Paul now?"

- Leah asks Jacob

Originally, Jacob and Leah didn't like each other. When Jacob and Seth broke off from Sam's pack and joined the Cullens, Leah decided to join them to look after her brother and get away from Sam. Though they were originally hostile towards each other, Jacob and Leah gained a new understanding to each other's feelings, bonding over their broken hearts, and became good friends, though she still dislikes hovering around vampires. Leah is later named Jacob's Beta, or second-in-command.

Occasionally, they would race in wolf forms. Since Leah is the fastest wolf, she always beats him, though often by a narrow margin.

While some fans believe that Leah fell in love with or imprinted on Jacob during Breaking Dawn, Stephenie Meyer has stated this isn't true. This would simply have made their interactions too complicated, since she started out disliking Jacob, then they gain a "friendly" understanding. If Leah had imprinted on Jacob at any time, it would have been the first time she saw him after her first transformation, and she would have had a compulsive need to be with/near him from that moment on. This is not the case. They are simply good friends.

Physical appearance
Leah as a human is described as beautiful in an exotic way. She has perfect copper skin and eyelashes "like feather dusters". She wears her sleek black hair in a short pixie cut after phasing, for the same reasons that the males shave their heads: long hair means longer fur.

Wolf form
In her wolf form, Edward describes her as a "smaller grey wolf".

Personality and traits
Leah is portrayed as angry and bitter as a result of her broken heart. She has a short temper, and often uses the pack's mental connection to remind the others of things they would rather forget; ostensibly to vent her pain at being connected to Sam. However, she also demonstrates considerable loyalty to them and protectiveness of her brother, and by the end of Breaking Dawn Leah has matured remarkably. She mentions to Jacob that she is considering community college and possibly meditation and yoga to help with her temper issues. She also implies that she intends to quit phasing as soon as she is able to control herself.

Although still kind of bitter, she is quite competitive in racing and would willingly accept any challenge.

Leah appears to dislike Bella, mainly because of her "torturing" Jacob, as she says in Eclipse (the movie): "If you're here to torture Jacob some more, feel free to leave." This continues to Breaking Dawn where she confronts Bella while she's pregnant and says things that deeply hurt Bella.



Wolf abilities
Phasing has stopped her menstrual cycle, and she gets bitter over it because she fears it may prevent her from having children or imprinting on someone.

Leah is known as the fastest wolf in her pack which Jacob calls is "her only claim".

Etymology
Leah is Hebrew for "weary", which might be intended to show that Leah is venting out anger on the pack

Appearances

 * New Moon (Mentioned)
 * Eclipse (First appearance)
 * Eclipse (film)
 * Breaking Dawn

Film portrayal
Leah is portrayed by Julia Jones in the film Eclipse.