Memories of the Sun
by P. Kirby

   Punched tin, thin metal decorated with patterned holes, was a popular art form in New Mexico. Jason's head felt like a punched tin candleholder, all recollection, how and why he hurt, spilling out in bright geometric patterns of pain.

   Memory, cold and remorseless, returned, creeping up his spine and into his swollen brain. His eyes opened and were met by a view of a dull gray ceiling.

   He pushed himself up, propped his body on his elbows and surveyed his surroundings. Cold gray walls, flaking paint to reveal cinderblock beneath, and a rather narrow door made up his makeshift prison. Dim light flickered though the door's iron bars.

   Next to the door, his companion slumped unconscious against the wall. Jason started toward the figure, stopped, and then crawled to the wall opposite his cellmate. Collapsing against the wall in a position that mimicked his partner in crime, he fixed his eyes on the unconscious person and tried to think.

   Even now, Darius remained their best chance for escape. Not only possessing equal--or possibly better--sorcery skills than Jason, he had the advantage of physical abilities no human could match.

   Except, at that moment, the majority of Darius's power, his strength, was splattered across his T-shirt in a dirty red tide. Blood crusted his boyish handsome face and clung in clumps to his hair. Thick coagulated globs hung on his right arm where broken bone had thrust through skin. Darius seemed dead.

   He is dead. Realizing the inherent danger of a badly wounded vampire, Jason pushed himself farther back along the wall.

   The vampire's eyelids twitched. "We're so fucked, Blair," Darius said, opening his eyes to stare defeated out the door.

   Darius's words filled Jason with despair and even a little guilt. This had been Jason's bright idea.

****************

   Jason Astin-Blair rarely acted on first impulse. And when he did, it got him into trouble. The first time he found himself in Darius's presence, alone, was the direct result of such an impulse.

   Stop by Regan's house without calling ahead. Brilliant.

   Darius was there, playing the part of soulless squatter to perfection. Neither was pleased to see the other, although Darius, in his usual unflappable manner, let Jason into the house without comment.

   Darius returned to the comfortable recliner, buried his nose in an Agatha Christie mystery, and ignored the young man. Jason sat on the couch, flipping through the evening television offerings. He threw the vampire pebble hard looks, burying twinges of conscience under resentment.

   The Holders of Light didn't know that Darius, brother of the notorious Brennus, currently resided in New Mexico. They were unaware of the existence of Regan O'Connell, child of prophecy and daughter of a vampire. They should have known. Jason was their employee.

   "So, you said she's at a rehearsal, then?" Jason asked.

   "She should be home in," Darius glanced at his watch and then pointedly at Jason's, "thirty minutes." Jason shifted his watch self-consciously. It was actually a vampire detector.

   Regan played violin although it wasn't her primary means of employment. Her primary vocation was Wolfe, a secret agent for The Grey Brethren, a vampire cartel.

   Jason resumed his channel surfing and vampire baiting. Finally, after at least thirty minutes, Darius lifted his gaze from the book and fixed his cold stare on Jason. "You are aware that I can feel, sense, all your emotions? Which, at the moment, consist almost entirely of some sort of twisted adolescent jealousy."

   "You're living with my girlfriend."

   "So?" the vampire drawled, a hint of a smirk on his face. "I'm her roommate. Big deal."

   "You--have--a--past." Jason spoke as though he were dealing with a three-year-old. And you're not her bloody roommate! Roommates pay rent.

   "That's why they call it a 'past,'" Darius lifted his fingers to make quotes.

   Past my ass. I've seen the way you look at her. Jason kept his retort to himself.

   "You act as though I've stolen something from you," muttered Darius as he turned his attentions back to the mystery novel.

   A recurring image flashed before Jason's eyes and he looked away. A moment later he felt Darius's cold appraisal and returned his gaze.

   "What?"

   The vampire smirked. "That's it, isn't it? I was first."

   When Jason had no response, he continued, "Why are humans so fixated on virginity? You equate it with innocence, don't you? Innocence is rarely lost to a night's passion. Only humans are stupid enough to think that they carry their innocence between their legs."

   Darius jerked his chin in Jason's direction. "You know when Regan lost it--innocence? It was gone long before our night together. Lost to one of your people. Cyrus-fucking-Purcell, Holder Researcher. He slaughtered her best friend, a human. It's a wonder she can stand the sight of you."

   Darius's anger robbed him of his, and Jason struggled, trying to find the righteous rage he felt a second before.

   "Did you ever use it, your power, to get a woman in bed?" asked Jason.

   "Are you asking if in my entire long lifetime--oh sorry, unlife--I've ever used Mesmer to coerce an otherwise unwilling female? Of course I have." His thumb flicked the pages of the book. "I'm a vampire, or hasn't your watch told you that?"

   Refusing to let the admission affect him, Jason asked, "And Regan, then?"

   Darius's eyes swept back and forth, taking in the book's contents. "Regan O'Connell came to my bed of her free will." With a trace of bitterness he added, "I couldn't hurt Regan, even if I wanted to."

   "You know . . ." Darius said, turned a page, "Regan has a word, a phrase for what we are doing. She calls it dick fencing and it doesn't impress her."

   Jason sighed heavily. Darius was right. A scantily clad, well-endowed blond was doing an oddly buoyant dance on the Spanish television show Sabado Gigante.

   Jason had never preferred blondes.

********************

   A year after his sister Juliet died, he joined the Holders of the Light. Two years later, he and Alison had their engagement ceremony. Jason faced his fate like the ultimate English caricature, stiff upper-lipped and emotionally constipated.

   Like Jason, Alison Trelawney was Holder Legacy, the result of generation after generation following the Holder dictum: keeping the world free of Non-Earth-Plane (NEP) entities. Or as Darius would say, swimming only in their well-guarded gene pool.

   Alison was beautiful. But unfortunately, Jason had never been inordinately fond of pale blond beauties. In his mind's eye he always saw them growing old before his eyes, sagging and pasty white with wispy thinning hair.

   They had sex the evening of the ceremony. When he reached for a condom, she had giggled, asking, "Do we really need that?" Smiling almost paternally he slipped the rubber on his flesh. The last thing he needed was to be bonded to her any sooner than necessary. Once inside her, she responded by saying his name over and over and over, "Jason, Jason, Jason," as though he had forgotten his own name.

   For his part, he pictured Kalista and found pleasure in the memory.

   Kalista, his longest relationship to date, had been a fellow engineering student at Cambridge. Their relationship was shallow but enjoyable. Sex with Kalista was harsh, filled with the sharp edges of some long buried frustration. Afterwards they would lie giggling, horrified and proud of shared bruises and scratches.

   There was no future in their coupling, but that didn't make the breakup any easier. Juliet was dead and he had to join the Holders. An honest explanation was impossible. A final onion-like layer on an already superficial relationship.

   But at least with Kalista he felt. And he used the sharp tang of her memory every time he fucked Alison.

****************************

   The two men sat in silence, Darius driving at or only slightly above the speed limit. The car, vintage Darius, overpriced and European, climbed into the Sandia Mountains of central New Mexico.

   Darius, who elevated self-preservation to an art form, was less than enthusiastic about helping the human. "I'm not looking for a fight," he said, the statement equivalent to the Pope declaring he was Catholic.

   "Get in, get out. No fighting unless absolutely necessary," Jason explained. Darius looked pained. "Look, I'd rather keep Regan out of this." She had been oddly ill. "And they are less likely to sense me if I have one of their own along."

   Darius had glanced mournfully at the television, probably envisioning himself in the recliner, a beer in hand and a soccer game on Univision. In the end, it was Jason's use of the R-word that got Darius out of the house.

   The car crunched up the dirt road, County-maintained and hence barely passable. They parked about a mile away from the building, and hiked the rest of the way over rocky ground peppered in a combination of piñon pine and scattered Ponderosa pine. Jason carried a red-light flashlight that he switched on only briefly.

   Stopping in the shadow of a large piñon, Jason waited while Darius listened. The structure was a typical metal warehouse, dull white and devoid of any intrinsic character. So uninspired it probably drove away God himself.

   Echoing his thoughts, Darius muttered, "So much for the days when great buildings were commissioned in the Lord's name."

   Jason nodded and closed his hand around the detector on his wrist. "I feel at least seven signatures." Besides Darius.

   "They are clustered, mostly on the second floor. There's only one guard on the west door." Darius cocked his head sideways. "There's some sort of warding magic on the place. Solid spell." Jason felt his glare. "What are you getting me into, Blair?"

   Jason stared at Darius, suddenly reminded of who and what he had chosen as backup. As a rule, Darius went out of his way, around the planet if necessary, to avoid conflict.

   "Keeping Regan out of this, remember?" Jason said, resorting to the R-word again.

   "Mmmm," the vampire grunted and abruptly headed toward the building. Jason followed closely hoping to disguise his scent with Darius's.

************************

   "Because they are not truly of this world," Juliet pronounced with a certainty born of years and years of Holder indoctrination, much at the hands of her father.

   Jason, shrinking under the needle-sharp gaze of his father, returned to picking at his plate of spaghetti. The dinner conversation had turned hard in the direction of dull and he had made the mistake of asking why Faeries couldn't live in proper houses instead of their mounds and hills. At six, he still lacked a firm grasp on Holder policies and the acceptable viewpoint.

   His sister Juliet, who had just turned nine, proceeded to proudly list the Seven Principles of Non-Earth-Plane diplomacy. Years later, Jason would refer to these principles as the Seven Principles of Not-on-My-Plane diplomacy. Now it was just boring.

   Just a short year ago, Juliet had been fun. On holiday at the family's summer home in Wales, he and his sister had spent the days combing the hills and ancient valleys seeking out the kingdoms of the Faeries and Elves. Not that they ever found any Elves, but even as a child Jason could feel the magic that bubbled up through the ground like a fantastic stream, matching frequencies with his own magic.

   They had found the remains of an old scarecrow, withered and likely never much good at its intended use. Together they had invented stories and infused the decaying thing with its own subtle enchantments. Sneaking out at night they would find him--they dubbed the scarecrow Chester--alive and glowing with the radiance of their immature glamours.

   But now, Juliet would never waste her energies on unsanctioned magic. The days progressed and she resembled their father more and more. Each day, she came home from school, a Holder school, further emboldened in her beliefs that NEP residents must be kept firmly in their place. When left to their own devices, the likes of Elves and Faeries could only do harm.

   It was nearly a relief when his parents divorced two years later. His mother packed Jason and his sister up and they moved to Wales. Once again in a place where supernatural energies surrounded and nurtured his spirit, Jason felt fully at home. But Juliet suffered and eventually seeing her daughter's pain, Sarah Astin--she had dropped Blair like poisonous snake--sent her back to London. Back to her Holder schools and like-minded friends.

   Sarah, determined to shield her remaining child--though loved dearly, she knew Juliet was lost to her--kept Jason away from all things Holder. When he returned to London, a few years later, he attended a non-Holder sanctioned school.

   Back in London, he saw his father and sister occasionally. At times, sitting before his sibling at a typical emotionally forced dinner, he would see a welcomed ghost of the girl he once knew. But by and large, Juliet was lost to him as well, replaced by a younger, female clone of Daniel Blair.

   "It had been her fondest wish, should anything ever happen to her, that you carry on her work." Juliet's words, according to her friends and colleagues. Even then, it seemed at least . . . contrived.

   He joined the Holders in memory of the girl who made an ugly scarecrow beautiful with magical light.

***********************

   "This doesn't feel right," Darius whispered, poised, one foot in the doorway. Living two thousand years on instincts that steered him through feast, famine, natural disasters and the occasional Van Helsing wanna-be should have given the vampire a bit more credibility.

   Instead, acting on impulse, driven by a belief in Darius's innate cowardice, Jason brushed past him. "Come on. The sooner we get the talisman, the sooner we leave."

   According to Jason's informant, the item was kept locked in a first floor office. The office sat right behind what had been the stage and pulpit area. A ratty banner still hung above the stage welcoming all to the Ponderosa Baptist Church.

   "Where Little Joe and the Cartwright clan worshipped?" Darius quipped.

   Jason paused, shining the flashlight in Darius's face. "You really do spend too much time with Regan," he whispered, referring to the vampire's uncharacteristic pop culture reference. "You're starting to sound like her."

   "I thought you were past the angst-filled jealousy thing?" Darius said, sliding out of the light's path.

   Jason sighed and crept across the stage and back to the office's door. "Nobody's home," Darius said, in response to Jason's unspoken concern.

   The office, like the rest of the building, lacked any aesthetic appeal. Jason walked over to a black metal file cabinet and Darius moved to the desk. In the dim red light a knife's metal edge flashed bloody as Darius worked the desk drawer open. Jason, lacking Darius's larcenous skills, used an unlock spell.

   The talisman was in the second drawer. "Got it." Jason drew the light across the motionless vampire. Darius listened, a sinister glimmer of yellow in his eyes.

   "That was entirely too easy," the vampire said. He spared Jason a golden-eyed glance and leapt over the table and toward the door.

   The door flew wide open and a human-like figure stepped through the door. Darius skidded to a halt no less than a foot from the newcomer and the two vampires, nearly comically, stared at each other.

   So fast that Jason's eyes could scarcely trace the action, the vampire slashed a long dagger at Darius's neck. Darius, stepped out of the weapon's path. His attacker, not a quick study, repeated the action three more times, each time Darius slipping out of harm's way. The third time, Darius dove down and forward and kicked his opponent's legs out from under him. A blade flashed and the vampire's head parted company with his neck.

   Darius stumbled back to avoid the results of the vampire's dusty demise. "Let's go," he said in a commanding tone. Jason scrambled after him.

*****************************

   As a signing bonus, the Holders provided Kyle a gorgeous blond wife. Once the novelty wore off--more precisely the novelty sloughed off and the real Kyle surfaced--the newlyweds quickly came to the unspoken conclusion that anything resembling happiness could be found elsewhere.

   Eva was Kyle's most recent source of happiness, assuming the definition of happiness was sex and not much else.

   "Older divorced women are so appreciative," Kyle, Jason's field partner for the past two years, advised sagely. "They're so grateful they'll do anything, I mean anything in bed."

   Eva reminded Jason of an only slightly less annoying version of Hyacinth from Keeping up Appearances and that negated any skills she possessed.

   The door opened and a young couple breezed into the pizza parlor. Eva turned to look at Jason. "Did I tell you Regan had a Ph.D.?" she asked.

   He poured a beer and drained half of it before smiling thinly. "Er, yes?" he tried, lying. Saying "no" would only make her chatter more.

   Kyle's only interest in Eva was horizontal, but actually explaining that to her would probably put a serious damper on relations of any geometry. She'd been insisting on spending time, fully dressed time, with the muscle-bound Holder. Kyle's solution was to drag Jason along and Eva's response, to play matchmaker, bringing along a blind date for Jason.

   And Jason wished ardently for more potent beer. From the mishmash of descriptions Eva had bombarded him with, Regan was either a heavyset woman like herself, or an earthy hippie by way of Santa Fe.

   Thursdays were one of three days Alison had designated to call--with Alison everything was scheduled--and dinner seemed like as good an excuse as any to be out of his flat. Ten minutes into the evening, he decided an hour on the phone listening to Alison's gossip report would have been preferable.

   An hour later, when Regan O'Connell--clearly relishing the Kyle and Eva show as much as he was--made her escape, Jason knew he was completely and irrationally in love. She was ethereally beautiful in a way he couldn't have imagined: raven black hair, bangs perpetually falling onto her face, elf-green eyes, delicate features kept from excessively cute by a touch of refinement, and a sharp feral wit that defined her as much more than a empty-headed pixie.

   Unbeknownst to him, within a few minutes, Regan had realized he was a Holder. In Regan's eyes, all Holders were culpable, their hands stained crimson by the blood of the prostitute who had been her friend. Even now, with decades separating her from the actual incident, the hatred ran hot and clear.

   And Jason . . . He needed her so badly his bones ached.

*******************************

   Making a sound like bone breaking, the wooden podium shattered, shards flying and sending Darius jumping for cover. The magic hummed in Jason's body and the words to the counter spell leapt to his mouth. Even in the dark, he felt the air shimmer and he pushed defensive magic in the direction of the previous spell. The two enchantments collided and the building shook.

   Darius climbed to his feet and with a quick signal to Jason, jumped off the stage and ran out a nearby door. Jason followed, feeling slow and lumbering compared to the vampire. Darius, waiting in one of many rooms that encircled the main meeting hall, gestured toward a door on the opposite wall. As Jason ran toward that door, he heard Darius muttering a spell that would block the first door.

   Pushing the door opened cautiously, he listened as much as his human senses allowed and then plunged through the door. His flashlight illuminated colorful posters that detailed various scenes from the Bible. Behind him, the vampire followed, shutting the door and setting the same block spell.

   "A whole heap of indoctrination for the kiddies," Darius said, moving on to the next door. Jason stood, frozen, thinking of his sister and all the others who had spent their formative years in Holder schools.

   "Waiting for Jesus?" Darius voice cracked through his thoughts. They hurried into the adjoining room and Darius pointed to a window. "Out there," he indicated, with the confidence of someone who expected compliance. Jason moved to the window and worked the lock on the cheap aluminum frame.

   Shuddering as though in the throes of some exotic pleasure, the building began to shift and waver. Jason's hand dropped from the window and he took two steps toward Darius, just as his partner took as many steps backward.

   A distinctly human and very alien expression settled on Darius's face. Fear.

   "Shit," Jason gasped while Darius cursed expansively in what sounded like ancient Greek.

   The metal structure, suddenly alive, took a deep breath. Jason's eardrums shrank from the concussive force of a door exploding open. Another door ripped open and then the door the two men stood before gave way and flew off its hinges.

   As far as Jason remembered the door didn't actually hit him. Instead he was punched backward by the accompanying frenetic magical energy. For a second he was truly flying and then the wall stopped his flight and darkness took him.

***************************

   Innate magic in humans is rare and coveted by the Holders. Claiming a divine right, greater good, etc., any human found with innate magic is coerced, threatened and molded into a form that fits their organization. Identification of such individuals is frequently at the hands of field operatives.

   Magical energy drifted through Jason's blood like sluggish adrenaline, but compared to Regan, his powers were a drop of blood in the ocean.

   Their first kiss was in his kitchen, a week after they had met. They spent their first night together a month later. That very first time was cathartic with an undercurrent of violence. Sparing little time on preliminaries, he held her down by the wrists, his frustrations flowing across her small frame and spilling sharply between her legs. She bore it stoically, in silent understanding. Later, suffused with the relief of her, in his bed, in his arms, he saw the bruises on her arms and apologized. Smiling wryly she shrugged and suggested, innocent and seductive, "Make it up to me?"

   Skin to skin, ethereal energies touched like two smoke plumes and then flowed over one another. Making love to Regan was like flying.

*******************

   "Are you mad, brother? Chaotic magic?" Darius's voice pulled at his consciousness.

   Jason eyes peeled open like a thick orange rind. He was lying, chest down on the floor, his eyes fixed on Darius's Nikes. Someone had switched on a flickering fluorescent light.

   As he watched, his brain sorting out lost connections, a pool of dark liquid grew as drop after drop of Darius's blood succumbed to gravity. Jason lifted his head. Darius stood facing at least four vampires, right arm cradled by his left.

   Standing several feet away, partially blocked by the other three vampires, stood a creature who was unmistakably Brennus, Darius's brother. His features were more angular, but in all other ways--even his gray eyes--he was nearly a mirror of his older brother.

   "A powerful tool, brother. I'd be a fool to deny myself such a weapon." Brennus said, his expression benign, as though he were discussing the day's weather report.

   "Powerful, like an atomic bomb. And yes, you are a fool," Darius said, his hate visible on his face.

   Brennus smiled, his eyes dropped to Jason and then lifted, signaling. Grunting in pain, Jason was ground down to the linoleum floor by a heavy foot between his shoulder blades.

   Unable to lift his head, all Jason could see were feet advancing toward Darius, followed by the undeniable sounds of what one might politely call a scuffle. Next came the distinctive sound of a vampire forced to a more aerosol state. Jason concentrated on the vampire detector on his wrist, trying to locate Darius's now familiar signature. He tried shifting his position only to have the foot jammed hard into his back. Bright currents of numbness chased down his spine.

   Remembering the stake launcher on his wrist, he tensed his arm and prepared the spell that fired the weapon. The angle seemed impossible, but he bent his arm back in the direction of the vampire and fired. His captor grunted and staggered back, and Jason rolled onto his back and fired again, this time sending the yew-wood stake at the vampire's chest.

   His head still spinning, Jason struggled to his feet. Darius was doing well for someone with a badly broken arm. Only two of the remaining vampires were attacking. Brennus hung back in the shadows. Jason leveled the bolt launcher at Brennus. The shot went wide and Brennus, without more than a cursory glance in Jason's direction, muttered one word.

   The world shifted in front of Jason's eyes and for second he couldn't remember the words to the defense spell. Tripping over the words, the magical energy slid though his body and protected him from Brennus's attack. The spell's muted impact staggered him backwards and to the floor.

   One of the vampires, a female, was a Wolfe, the dark ebony sword looking odd in the hands of someone other than Regan. Brennus tossed a second spell in Darius's direction.

   The actions of the combatants, vampires, were too fast to track, but Darius appeared to be holding ground. He dodged another ripping sword blow and snapped the female with a solid kick sending her stumbling back toward Brennus. Brennus's spell slammed into the stunned Wolfe and flung her right back at Darius.

   Darius dodged, distracted by the effort of fending off the second vampire. The Wolfe flew past, clipping him on left side, shoving his defensive arm away from his attacker. The second vampire cut a wicked dagger at Darius's shoulder and made contact. Even where Jason crouched, he heard the vampire's sharp gasp.

   Jason lifted his arm and fired at the Darius's opponent. The shot flew low and hit the creature in the thigh. Poisonous yew-wood biting into the vampire's flesh, he staggered back and Darius raised his arm for a killing blow.

   And then Brennus lifted a small, dark, wooden box.

   The air compressed upon itself, wild potential energy shifted to enchantment and a dark pulse of magic darted toward Darius. The surge hit him high in the chest, spreading its powers across his torso. Rather than knocking him backward, it dropped him in his tracks. Eyes on his brother, stunned horror on his face, Darius slumped to his hands and knees.

   Brennus slipped forward, shoving his wounded soldier aside, and with the grace of a dancer, cracked a spinning kick into his brother's face. "This is getting tedious," he said. Darius crumpled.

   Jason opened his mouth, a spell waiting, but the Wolfe descended on him, a blow falling heavy on his bruised skull. Brennus stood over his prone brother, smiling like a man who had just bedded a supermodel. Jason's collar tightened around his throat as the Wolfe tangled a handful of shirt in her hands and lifted him up. As the darkness consumed his consciousness, he heard the flat notes of Brennus raining blows on his unconscious brother.

***********************

   Small and delicate boned nearly to the point of frail, it was hard to imagine her as a killer, even though he'd seen her fight. Regan stood in her kitchen, hot New Mexico sunlight streaming in through the window, the expression on her face icy.

   "Tell me it isn't true." Jason flung the manila folder, heavy with evidence, on the tile counter top.

   Long musician's fingers pushed her black shield of hair off her face. "Why?"

   "Why? What was done . . . he was tortured, he . . ."

   Her eyes, faintly exotic hinting at something beyond ordinary, dropped to the floor and back up to meet his. "So?" she said. Her hair, persistently obstinate, slid back over her face.

   "So? A man is dead and all you can say is so?"

   "The man in question has been dead for fifty years," she spat. "Cyrus Purcell was hardly worthy of the word. Man. On his worst day, even Darius has never done what . . ." The distinctive lilt of an Irish brogue wrapped around her words.

   "Darius is a vampire," he said.

   "Darius is my friend!" She turned her face away, arms crossed across her chest, her profile breaking the sunlight.

   "Why, Regan? Why?" Jason's voice cracked.

   "Why?" Anger riding incredulous shone from her eyes. "How can you even ask?"

   "You should have told the authorities. The police--"

   "The police? What did the police care for a prostitute? It was the 1920s! You weren't there, Blair. You have no bloody idea."

   "So you just--"

   "I killed him. I pulled his intestines out, ropy and long and I let him scream and scream and scream. I made him scream, once for every person who had ever been lured to his laboratory. For every person who cried out in incalculable pain at his hands."

   "And you take pride in that?"

   "Yes," she responded, unfolding her arms and taking one step in his direction. "What do you think I am, Blair?" She snarled his last name. "What exactly am I to you? Jason Astin-Blair's domesticated vampire? Your little walk on the wild side? Always tell the truth and be a good boy and maybe someday I'll be a real girl?"

   He stared at her, an odd pain ferreting into his soul. "I don't know. I have no bloody idea."

   "Get out." Her slim hand pointed to the door, her voice hard.

   He took a step toward her. "Regan."

   Like a sad dance, she stepped away from him. Abruptly she closed her eyes, her body quivered and she turned to lean on the kitchen table.

   His anger fleeing like shadows from light, he closed the distance between them. "Regan. What is it?"

   "Nothing," she said. Not looking at him, she added, "Why are you still here?"

   "You're getting worst. Maybe--"

   "I'm fine."

   He lifted his hand towards her and she flinched.

   "I said, 'Get out!'" Her green eyes lifted and something fey and inhuman flashed in their green depths.

   He took a step back, hands raised in exasperation and surrender.

   "Fine," he muttered, stalking out of the house and into the bright sunlight.

****************************

   Consciousness was illusive for Darius, sneaking away at a moment's notice. The vampire's body tried frantically to repair itself, falling back on its only resource--rest.

   Jason watched and waited, his mind sorting though options. "What?" he whispered when Darius's eyes snapped open. In the last hour, Darius's facial expressions had given his ordinarily stony exterior a workout.

   The vampire's eyes closed. "Regan," Darius said, his eyes still closed. "Brennus wants Regan."

   "Wh—why?"

   "The challenge and because of me." Lifting his left hand, he gingerly scraped at a scab above his eye.

   "Why now? You've been friends for decades," Jason asked, stumbling over the word "friends."

   "Decades aren't much when measured against millennia."

   Jason rubbed his forehead. "Regan. Regan can handle him." He fixed a rock hard stare at Darius. "This was a setup."

   "Ya think?" Darius grunted sarcastically.

   Jason's fingers picked at peeling paint over the cinder block and he wrestled with memory in the silence. Regan's friend had lost his battle with consciousness again. As of late, Darius's romantic interest in Regan bothered him less and less. It was almost comforting to know that someone loved her as much as he did, someone who would always be there to look after her.

   Frankly, it was their friendship that bothered him more; a friendship stretching back decades. He envied Darius the connection, the memories and adventure, extending across two continents and a few Non-Earth-Planes.

   Darius pulled his eyes open. "You're doing the angst thing again."

   "Sorry," Jason answered, shaking his head. "I can't believe I was so stupid--"

   "You have to get out of here. Find Regan. Now." Darius rolled his head on his neck to look at Jason. "Regan. She was at my house." Darius had recently acquired his own flat.

   Jason's expression tightened. "Why?" He gulped, as Darius gave him a knowing look. Pushing back his jealousy, he added, "Your point?"

   "I left her there . . . came over to her house to get some of her things." At Jason's thinly disguised alarm, Darius elaborated, "Look, she collapsed in a heap on my living room floor. I put her to bed, yes, my bed." His shoulders lifted in an approximation of a sigh. "Brennus doesn't need an invite to enter a vampire's home."

   "You think she's still there?"

   "If she is, she's in no condition to deal with Brennus."

   "And he's using chaotic magic." Jason pushed his hand through his hair, fingers finding a painful lump.

   Evidently as in thrall to pain as anyone else, Darius's face contracted as he shifted position. "Get out of here, Blair. The lock on the door is pitiful. Even now, I could handle the magic to open it."

   "And you?"

   "I'm not going much of anywhere."

   Jason rubbed his wrist where the vampire detector had been. "They're still out there, aren't they? Listening."

   "Yeah. But Brennus and his little box of tricks is gone. Wolfe went with him. That leaves three, at least," Darius said.

   "Then they'll be expecting me, what? I'm unarmed." He scrubbed his temples again. "It is rather difficult to cast with a concussion."

   "Tell me about it," Darius whispered, struggling to stay awake. Seconds later, his shoulders slumped, his system forcibly shutting down. In time, Darius's body would heal enough to hunt and take in a vampire's best remedy.

   Regan might not have time. Darius was still their best chance.

   "Your emotions are really peculiar now. I think I preferred angst," Darius said. "And why are you still here?"

   Ignoring the echo Darius's words caused, Jason said, "You should go."

   "I've really overestimated your intelligence. I'm serious fucked up."

   "And blood will fix that . . . quickly."

   Darius opened his eyes and shot Jason a feeble dark look. "That's a trip you don't want to take, Blair."

   "You stand a far greater chance of getting past that lot," Jason gestured with his eyes to beyond the door, "than I do."

   "I'm sure Brennus anticipated as much. Why do you think he dumped you in here, alive, with me? Twisted little shit set it up."

   Jason frowned at Darius. "So?"

   "I'm not giving him what he wants."

   "If you don't do this, he'll get precisely that. Regan O'Connell." Real anger flared like a brushfire in Jason's belly. "I think the applicable words are . . . dick fencing."

   Jason's words impacted the vampire; the ghost of an emotional blow shimmered across his face.

   "This is your chance to get me out of the picture for good," Jason offered as additional incentive.

   "You're human, Jason. Time will take you out of the picture with no help from me." Darius's eyes glowed silvery in the faint light. His left hand slid along his right forearm. Jason cringed at the sound of ragged bone grinding on bone.

   "You know I'm right," Jason said. "It's the most logical course of action."

   "Thank you, Mr. Spock," the vampire said. His lips parted and his tongue flashed red over blunt human teeth. "I don't want to do this, Jason."

   Jason smiled wryly. "Er, well, I'd have hoped for another option." Considering his next words, he spoke carefully, "Darius, if it comes to it, I don't want to be . . . turned."

   Without looking at the human, Darius nodded. He turned to meet Jason's eyes. "I envy you," he said. Real emotion, foreign to his dark eyes, shone like a bright beacon. "You've seen her. In the sun's light."

**************************

   The sun, ever abundant in the New Mexico, took a rare holiday, allowing stormy weather, dark clouds rolling and wind tearing, to take center stage. Jason waited outside the movie theater, waiting and wondering if she was late or . . . Minutes later, she walked across the parking lot, gray daylight, but daylight nevertheless, mirrored in her ivy green eyes. She smiled and apologized for being late. "I'm always late," she admitted.

   After their first kiss, he questioned the point of dating. He was engaged, trapped in a job that expected him to betray her. Two days later, he waited, on a yellow bright day, by her car. The daylight picked out the rare hints of red secreted in her black hair and her fair skin glowed in the weak winter warmth.

   Dizzy and disoriented, Jason seal-basked in the bright rays, hot radiance, and searing memories of the sun.

 ©2004 P. Kirby