Fiat Lux (Illuminated Book One)

Born To Die

*****

As the sun rose, we slipped out of Jones Hall and took the St. Charles streetcar downtown. At the end of the line, I went up to Jackson Square with Ruaridh, and Blair took the bus into the Marigny. I would follow him a couple of buses later. As I waited, I wandered through the Square, admiring the deep, vivid colors of the flowers.

It all happened at once. Someone snatched Ruaridh from my hands while someone else restrained me, with one hand over my mouth and one around my lower torso. A scuffle took place in front of me, and I realized my attackers were now fighting my baby. My baby; Ruaridh had shifted from baby form into a young man, long-legged and limber. I watched in shock for a moment. My baby....

Ruaridh fought off one agent and was prepared to take on another when he looked back at me. My captor had brandished a dagger and was holding it to my throat. Meanwhile, the other two agents were closing in on him again.

"Run!" I shouted.

It was a good call. The two agents took off after Ruaridh, who disappeared into the French Quarter. The one holding me withdrew his knife, and spun me around, clearly intending to knock me out, but someone knocked him out first.

Someone vaguely familiar.

I didn't have time to place it. The person knocked me out too. But I came to a couple of minutes later. I was sitting on a bench with my hands in my lap, holding down a thin napkin that kept trying to flap away in the autumn breeze.

I looked at the napkin. It was plain and unused, except for a tiny bit of writing in one corner.

GO HOME

The next bus had not even arrived yet. Was this a trick? I turned the napkin over. There was a little more writing in another corner.

NOW

I had just lost Ruaridh. Had someone gone after Blair too? With a deep breath - meant to settle my nerves - I shifted into light and beamed myself directly to my neighborhood. The agents be damned.

*****

At my front door, I shifted into human form again and placed my hand on the knob. It moved with my slightest touch. Carefully, slowly, I crossed the threshold and inched my way down the hallway. There had definitely been a fight - my hallway was a mess. But it all stopped at the kitchen door.

I peered into the kitchen. A tall figure was seated at the table. Blair. Good. I started toward him - and started to realize that what had seemed "good" was actually very, very bad.

He did not move as I drew closer. He did not even seem to breathe. "Blair?" I whispered.

His eyes shifted toward me. Not his head, just his eyes. "Roscoe."

Now I was close enough to see everything fully. A wound in his back was oozing blood onto the floor beneath his chair. Blood was running from his left shoulder down his arm, and from his lower abdomen as well. He was - or had been - bruised all over. Most concerning, though, was the bullet hole in the middle of his head, from which blood dripped into his beautiful eyes.

"Blair." I reached for his hand. It was perfectly cold. "They attacked you."

"An ambush, yes." His lips barely moved.

I felt my body shaking. "How... they... you're alive."

"I'm not."

"Of - of course you are." I wanted to believe he was, anyway. "You're talking."

"I tied my life to the life of one of my attackers."

That truly made me shudder. "Can... can you do that?"