Loading and strapping the guitar case down in the back of the BMW, I thought I heard some noise from the front of the car but when I peeked over the back seat I didn't see anything. Shutting the rear hatch, I looked around for Emmy but didn't see her anywhere. Worried because I had no idea where Emmy could have gone, I heard the noises again and thought it sounded like some kind of scuffle coming from the entrance to a small alleyway between buildings.

Peeking down the gap between the buildings my worst fears came true. In the dim light filtering down the narrow passageway from the streetlights behind me I saw that Emmy was struggling against two guys who were doing a good job of beating her up. I imagine that if Emmy had been dressed for a fight she could have defended herself better, but her long, tight cocktail dress did her no favors at all.

The larger of the two guys was holding Emmy roughly by her arms while the smaller guy, who was facing Emmy but away from me, was punching her repeatedly. Only later did I realize that none of them were making any more noise than just the sounds of their movements.

Without even pausing for a second, I rushed down the walkway and used the last six months of kickboxing training and kicked the guy doing the punching as hard as I could right in the side of the ribs. It slammed him into the brick wall to my left, momentarily stunning him. In that instant I got a much clearer view of the scene and what was actually going on, which was worse than I'd realized.

Emmy was dazed, all fight already beaten out of her. The taller of the two Night Children (it was now clear that's what they were) was holding Emmy up by her arms, her face towards his. The shorter guy had torn the back of Emmy's dress open and had been about to cut into her back with the wicked looking knife he held in his hand.

Enraged, I kicked him again straight in the chest, knocking him against the wall one more time and causing him to drop his knife. Without even the slightest hesitation I scooped the knife up off the ground and punched him right in the gut with it as hard as I could. I felt the knife sink into his belly with the blow and he slid down the wall, all fight completely gone.

The second guy threw Emmy to the ground, but his slow reaction was his undoing. I leapt at him, completely focused and not hesitating one tiny bit.

I put everything I had into that punch, and it did the job. A memory of my father came to me as the guy slammed to the ground from the blow to his face. "There is no such thing as a fair life-or-death fight," my dad said, teaching what self-defense skills he could to an eight-year-old girl. "Do anything you can to win."

It would have made my father proud to see what all that speed and weight training can do when you kick a man as hard as possible straight in the family jewels. Unsatisfied with that, I kept kicking and punching him until he stopped moving at all.

The whole fight (well, the part I was involved in, anyway) couldn't have taken more than a couple of minutes, but while I'd put the two guys down for the count, Emmy was out, too. She had been beaten really bad and was unconscious from her injuries. Staying focused and totally amped on adrenalin, I picked her up as easily as if she were a rag doll and carried her back to the car. I loaded her in, my mind working overtime on a plan.

I punched in the nearest hospital on the GPS, and checked the street signs as I drove away. In the few minutes it took to get to the emergency room I called Michael. "Take Jassie to Donny and Sana's house, and gather up as many guys who can fight as you can, as fast as you can,” I ordered him. "Emmy was attacked tonight and badly hurt. I fought and beat the two attackers, but I want you and the guys to make sure they don’t get away. I left them in an alley by the corner of-" and here I read off the two street signs. "Find them, but be careful. I hurt 'em pretty good, but they might still be dangerous. Find them and take them someplace secure, but not anywhere near any of our homes. Someplace close to where you find them. Don't kill them, just keep them for me until I get there. Also, and this is even more important, clean up that alley. I don't want any blood left behind, or anything else that can be traced to Emmy and me or the two Night Children that attacked us. Oh, and don't tell Jassie anything," I added.

"They were Night Children?" asked Michael, stunned. “You and Emmy were attacked by Children of the Night?”

“Yeah, two guys. Now get moving, and do what I told you as fast as you possibly can."

Hanging up, I called Donny. "Donny, Michael is bringing Jassie over. As soon as he drops her off, leave her with Sana and come up to San Francisco General Hospital. I'm taking Emmy to the emergency room. Don’t tell Jassie anything."

At the hospital, they reacted quickly when I carried an unresponsive and bloody Emmy in the E.R. doors. After they put her on a gurney and wheeled her back into the examining area and out of my sight, the nurse ushered me back to an exam table, saying "Here. Let me take a look at that cut."

I was confused for a moment, but when I touched my cheek and my fingers came away covered in blood I realized that the guy with the knife had managed to nick me and I'd been so pumped with adrenalin I hadn't even noticed.

It didn't take long for the nurse to get me cleaned up and for the doctor and his needle and thread to stitch me closed. In all honesty, I really didn't care what they were doing to my face. All I wanted to know was how Emmy was doing. They couldn't tell me anything right then, so soon I was back in the waiting room wishing somebody would let me know Emmy's condition.

Michael called before Donny even got to the hospital. "We found them,” he said. “We are cleaning up the alley right now. Where do you want us to take them?"

"Someplace private, where we won't be bothered. Find someplace quiet and out of the way." Since that was exactly the kind of place Night Children used to hide from daylighters, I knew they would be able to do it. "Make sure nobody sees anything."

Just as I hung up a police officer walked over to ask some questions. I told him Emmy was attacked by a couple of guys. I didn't get a good look, I said, but I did see they both had shaved heads. They ran off when I showed up and punched one of them in the face, I explained. My story about poorly seen skinheads seemed to satisfy the officer, to my relief. I hated lying, but this time it was necessary.

By this time Donny had arrived, but waited until the cop left to come over.

"Skinheads? Really? Wow," he said, sitting down and wrapping his arm around my shoulders and pulling me into a hug.

Looking to make sure the cop couldn’t hear, I whispered "No, it wasn’t skinheads. It was a couple of Night Children. I had Michael round up some of our guys to find them. I was waiting for you here so I could take off and deal with the two of them." I think I was as surprised as Donny that I was still in action-figure mode and didn’t particularly need or want comforting at that moment.

"Um, Leah, what do you mean 'deal with them'?" Donny asked in a whisper, suddenly not looking like he wanted the answer. "Did you tell Michael to beat the guys up?"

"Didn't have to," I answered. "I beat the shit out of 'em myself."

"You did what?" Donny stammered.

"The less you know, the better," I told him. "Look, I've got to go deal with this. You stay here and be here when Emmy wakes up. Tell her I love her and I'm taking care of loose ends."

"Fuck, Leah," he said, nervous. "Just... don't do anything I wouldn't do," he begged.

"It's too late for that," I replied, as I pulled out my phone to call Michael. "Way too late for that."

I found the place that Michael had secured easily enough. Parking in the alley parking spot for a shop that was out of business, I went in the back door the guys had jimmied, pushing the door open with my elbow. There were no lights at all (which was fine for the Night Children) but I had to use the mini mag light I'd grabbed from the glove box.

Michael led me to the empty back storeroom where three other men were standing around, looking at the two who'd attacked Emmy. The two attackers were seated on the floor, slumped against the wall, unmoving. The reaction when I entered the room was unexpected- all our guys stepped back from me and bowed.

Ignoring the weird behavior, I snapped at Michael. "I told you not to kill them. I needed to know why they attacked Emmy!" I was pissed off, and the adrenalin still pumping through my system was keeping me very keyed up.

"We didn’t do anything to them, my queen," Michael answered, using an honorific he'd never used for me before. "You did."

"Are they both dead?" I asked, afraid of the answer. I'd thought maybe I'd killed the first guy when I stabbed him with the knife, but to hear I'd killed both of them, well, that was a bit much.

"When we found them, Prince Marfan was dead and his servant was very nearly so, my queen."

"This was Prince Marfan?" I asked, indicating the shorter of the two, the one who had held a knife poised to carve his name into Emmy's back. In some back corner of my brain I knew that the idea of Emmy being disfigured so horribly was going to make me sick, but I kept my focus on the moment at hand. "You said his friend wasn’t dead when you found him. Did he have anything to say?" I demanded.

"He said we were all traitors to our race and that we were going to die for our sins," Michael answered.

"Yeah, no great surprise there," I said, stepping in closer to get a better look. I'd never seen any dead people before, much less ones I myself had killed, so it was a new and very unpleasant experience. Again, in the back of my mind I knew I was going to have to deal with some serious emotional issues from this night, but now was not the time to freak out. Examining Prince Marfan's strange gray ashy skin by the light of my small flashlight, I asked "Why does he look like that? He didn't look like that before."

"No, he didn’t," Michael agreed. "That is what happens when we die. The spirit of the night leaves us, and in death we resemble day walkers."

"Huh," I said, surprised. "I guess that answers some questions about how you've managed to stay hidden for so long."

After a few moments of really looking close at the two guys I said “Well, it doesn't look like we're going to learn much about why they attacked Emmy, unless it was just some kind of hatred for her betraying the race, as they said." The four living Night Children nodded their heads in agreement, and I suddenly realized that the only one who'd said a single word to me was Michael. Weird, but a lot of other things were higher up on the list of stuff demanding my attention, so I ignored it.

"I want you to find some way to get rid of the bodies so they will never, ever be found. This is on you, Michael. This is very, very freaking important. Whatever you have to do, make absolutely certain that no evidence ever, ever comes back to haunt Emmy and me. You cleaned up the alley, right?" When they all nodded, I said "Clean it up again. Use bleach; get a hose- whatever it takes. And these two guys? I never want to hear about them again."

My commands clear as a bell, Michael only had one more question. "What should we do with their things?" he asked, pointing to a shelf. Looking through the stuff for possible clues, I picked up Prince Marfan's wicked looking knife, now clean and free of blood.

"This is now mine," I said, looking them all in the eyes. "It's my trophy, and this proves that we will not be defeated. Burn the rest." Nodding at the rightness of my actions, the guys all made to follow my orders. I indicated Michael should follow me out, and back in the parking lot I asked "Is this the same knife he used on Jassie?" in as gentle a voice as I could manage. Michael nodded that yes, it was. "Then I'm glad to have taken it from him. Call me when everything is taken care of. Don't tell your daughter anything yet. I want you and me to tell her what happened together."

When I got back to the hospital, Emmy still hadn't awoken from her injuries. "They've taken her for some MRIs. They're really worried about internal injuries, and maybe brain damage," Donny explained. "The admitting nurse had some questions about payment and I told her that you'd talk to her as soon as you got back," he added.

"Did you tell them where I went?"

"How could I? I had no idea myself!" he protested.

"Yeah, and that's a good thing, believe me." He must have believed me, because he sure didn’t ask questions about it at all.

"Donny, you can go home now. Thanks for coming," I said, but he didn't want to leave, and honestly, I appreciated the company.

After dealing with the admitting nurse and all her questions about payment, we sat in silence for at least an hour before Donny finally spoke.

"Leah," he said, unsure how to approach the subject.

"Yeah?"

"I heard you tell the cop you punched one of the guys and they ran away."

"Uh huh," I agreed, noncommittally.

"That's not really what happened, is it?"

"Well, I did punch one of the guys in the face," I confirmed.

"There's more to the story than that, isn’t there?"

"Yeah."

"You know I'm ass deep in the whole Night Children thing, right? Sana's told me some things..."

"Yeah?" I asked, wondering how much Donny might have guessed.

"She told me that what Emmy wants to do, expose the Night Children, I mean. Sana said that there are others among them that think it's a really bad idea, and might get violent. I'm guessing that’s what this was about, wasn’t it?"

"Yeah, you're right. It was a couple of Night Children guys, and it does look as if it was about Emmy’s fame."

"And you told the cop it was skinheads because?"

"Two reasons. First, there's no need to expose the Night Children by way of a lurid news story about political violence between their nations. Second, because pointing the finger at white supremacists puts Emmy in a more sympathetic light when the news gets out that she was attacked by a couple of racists..."

"Wow. I have to say, Leah, that's pretty damned cold and calculating."

"Yeah, it is, isn't it? And you know what's funny?” I asked, feeling the irony. “Something Emmy did back in high school made me think of it."

"So, um, when you left to go 'take care of some things'," Donny said, making air quotes with his fingers, "Is it correct to say that the guys that attacked Emmy won't do it again?"

"Donny," I said, my tone as serious as I could make it. "You never heard this. If this ever gets to any sort of criminal investigation, the less you know the better."

"Oh, fuck," Donny whispered. "You had the guys kill ‘em!"

"No, I didn't,” I hissed back. “I promise you, none of the guys killed anybody."

Donny thought about it for a while, then, still whispering asked "They didn’t need to, did they?"

"No, they didn't. All I had them do was clean everything up."

"Did you actually kill somebody, Leah? I mean, honest to fucking god, did you kill somebody?" His voice was far from steady, but he did manage to look me straight in the eye when he asked.

"I didn't mean to," I confessed. "But there was no way I was gonna let ’em hurt her any more. When I saw them hitting her in that alley, I just kinda went into attack mode, you know? I'm pretty sure that I never could have done much if I hadn’t gotten them by surprise, but I just... I don't know. In all the books they say you see red, but it wasn’t like that at all. I didn't stop to think for even a second- I just launched into those two guys like a freaking pit bull and pounded the living shit out of 'em." I felt relieved to tell Donny, but I was also very aware that it was a really bad idea. I mean, I'd just committed a crime that could get me the death penalty, and now I was admitting it to him. All I could do is hope Donny would keep it to himself.

"But it was self defense, right?" Donny asked, clearly thinking along the same lines as me.

"I guess so, but that doesn't make me happy about it."

"Maybe not, but better them than Emmy," Donny said with conviction.

“Yeah,” I agreed. “Much better.”

It was a long time before they finally let me back to see Emmy. She looked so small in that big hospital bed, and so very vulnerable.

"The scans look good. She's suffered extensive but not life-threatening injuries. There is a possibility of renal failure, but we have to wait for further tests to know for certain. It might be a while before she wakes up, but there's no indication of permanent damage to her brain." When I didn’t respond, the doctor continued. "I have some questions about her I was hoping you could answer." I was hardly paying any attention to what he was saying. I was stroking Emmy's snow-white hair, trying to ignore the bandages on her face. The beeping of the machines hooked to her body by various wires and tubes only served to hammer home how fragile and tenuous our grip on life could be.

"I'm sorry, what?" I asked, realizing that the doctor had asked me a question.

"I've never seen anybody like her before," the doctor repeated. "Is her coloration natural?"

Biting back the urge to tell him it's because she only drinks India ink, I replied "Yeah. It's genetic."

"Are you sure?” he asked, a dubious expression on his face.

"Of course I'm sure," I snapped, my patience worn thin, and many hours of stress and exertion taking its toll.

"No, look, I'm sorry,” he apologized. "It's just that I've never seen anybody like her before, or even ever heard of anybody with skin that color."

"No, I'm the one who should be sorry,” I sighed. “It's been a long night, and the girl I'm going to marry just got beaten within an inch of her life by people who hated her because of that skin color. I'm feeling really stressed right now. Can we talk later?" I pleaded, and the doctor relented.

"Sure. I'll be by later."

Once he was gone, I climbed onto that big hospital bed and wrapped my arms around that delicate, abused little body that lay there, hopefully dreaming of a better place.

A little while later a nurse came by to check on Emmy's condition and made me get off the bed, so I waited until she was gone and climbed back on and held Emmy in my arms again.

I don't know how long I slept, but I woke to the sound of Emmy whispering my name. When she saw I was awake, Emmy whispered "What happened? Are you O.K.?"

"Oh, god, Em! You're the one they beat up, and you're asking me if I'm O.K.?" I spluttered, astounded.

"They didn't hurt you, did they?" Emmy asked again, her voice quiet and raw.

"No, they didn't get a chance. They aren't going to hurt you again, either."

"What happened?" Emmy asked, alarmed at the tone of finality in my voice.

"I killed them, Em. When I saw them hurting you I just went crazy and I killed them both. I didn't mean to," I said, and the whole thing just hit me like a ton of bricks. I was suddenly overwhelmed, and all the things is been holding back came rushing to the front. I felt sick, ashamed, guilty, afraid, worried, and just about everything else all at once. I'll admit it was too much, and I broke down completely.

"Shh, baby. Shh," Emmy whispered, her voice rough with her own pain. We just held each other like that, crying in each other's arms for quite a while. I vaguely heard someone come in and then leave again, but whoever it was chose not to interrupt our tear-fest.

Eventually I got myself together and told Emmy what had happened after she was knocked out. When I got to the part about calling our guys, I felt a little bit guilty. “I knew I had to do something,” I explained. “And what’s the point of being the queen if I can’t use it to our advantage? I told Michael to have all the strays meet at the studio tonight. Shit just got real, and it’s time to tighten up and get our act together.”

“What are you going to do?” she asked, not even batting an eye at my assumption of her role as queen.

“I’m gonna do what I have to,” I answered, which seemed to satisfy Emmy. “Whatever it takes.”

“Thank you,” whispered Emmy, her strength fading.

“Don’t thank me, Em. It’s not necessary. I want you to know that I will do anything for you. Anything at all, any time it’s needed, ever.” I don’t think Emmy heard me, though, because she’d slipped back into unconsciousness.

I drifted off to sleep soon after, totally exhausted.

A new nurse woke me in the morning. Standing there in the room was a man in a suit, evidently some kind of representative for the hospital. He was there to tell me that there were some reporters who wanted to talk to me about what had happened, and asked what I wanted to do about it.

“I guess I need to talk to them,” I groaned. “Can you tell them I’ll be there in ten minutes?”

When he left, I used the time to wash my face and finger-comb my hair into something halfway reasonable. I was still wearing the same clothes from the show, and I noticed some dried blood on my jacket. I tried to blot it off as best as I could with paper towels and water from the sink in the bathroom. Satisfied it didn’t show too much on the black cloth, I followed the hospital guy to a meeting room, where a handful of reporters were waiting.

I’d known I would have to talk to the reporters at some point, but I wasn't thrilled with the idea. I had to give them the same story I'd told the police, about Emmy being attacked by a couple of white guys with close-cropped hair, and I knew better than to add too much detail. I mean, I'm a terrible liar, so a confused story with poorly remembered details was the best way to go.

One face in the small crowd looked very familiar, and it only took me a moment to recognize him as the Rolling Stone writer from the show the night before. I gave him a nod to show I saw him, then announced myself to the group of reporters. I was nervous, especially with the camera crews filming me for the evening news, but I had to get it done.

"My name is Leah Farmer, and I'm Emmy De Lascaux's fiancée," I began. Saying it like that sounded strange to my ears, but hey, this was San Francisco, wasn’t it? It's not like they hadn't ever seen same-sex couples, right?

"Last night, immediately after The Downfall's show at the Red Lantern, Emmy was attacked and badly injured by two men." Ignoring some questions shouted by some of the reporters, I continued. "I was loading Emmy's guitar in the car when I heard a noise. Looking around, I couldn't see Emmy, but I heard some more noises coming from a nearby alley. When I looked to see what was going on, I saw two guys beating her up. I rushed in and kicked one of the guys and punched the other in the face and they ran away. I brought Emmy to the emergency room as quickly as I could, and she's been in intensive care since."

Looking around for questions, I pointed to the writer from Rolling Stone.

"Can you describe the two men?" he asked.

"Not really," I replied. "It was dark in the alley and I didn't get a very good look. All I saw us that it was two white guys with shaved heads."

"Did they say anything?" another reporter asked.

"If you're asking if they explained their motivations, no, they didn’t. The only things I heard them say were things like 'bitch!' and 'fuck!' and stuff like that." That got a few laughs, which really wasn't my intention, but whatever.

"Why do you think they attacked Emmy?" somebody else asked.

"Your guess is as good as mine," I replied.

"Why did they run off?" was the next question.

"My guess was they weren't prepared for broken ribs and noses," I said.

"So you think that you hurt them that badly?" asked an older guy with well-manicured silver hair, skepticism oozing through his voice.

"I'll tell you what," I said. "Come up here and let's see what I can do to you." I raised my fist so they could see the bruising on my knuckles. This got a laugh at the guy's expense, which he didn't appreciate.

“What’s Emmy’s condition right now?” asked a reporter who looked as if she was still in college.

“Well, the doctors told me that she’s got a concussion, but the MRIs don’t look as if there’s any serious damage to her brain. They said something about possible kidney damage, and we’ll have to wait for more testing on that. She has a couple of broken ribs, but thankfully her lungs weren’t punctured. She has plenty of bruises and cuts, but nothing that won’t heal.” Listing Emmy’s injuries like that, all clinical and detached, sure made it seem a whole lot less immediate than seeing her in that hospital bed. “The doctor says that she will probably recover completely.”

“The police report said her clothes were torn. Can you tell us about that?” asked the young-looking reporter.

“Oh, damn! I forgot to tell the officer about that,” I said, thinking about how I was going to say it. “When I found the two guys in the alley, Emmy was already knocked out. One of the guys was holding her up while the other guy had torn open the back of her dress and was about to carve something into her back with a knife he had.”

“I’m sorry, he what?” asked the girl, not sure she’d heard me correctly.

“He had a knife, and he was about to cut her up with it. I got the impression that they didn’t want to kill her, because he didn’t stab her or anything. He was going to permanently scar her or something.”

“So it wasn’t a sexual assault?” she asked, still wanting more details.

“No, I don’t think so. I mean, they tore her dress to expose her back, not anything else.”

“What do you think they were going to carve into her back?” the reporter persisted.

“I don’t know. Your guess is as good as mine. I’d never seen these guys before, and as far as I know Emmy has no enemies, so I have no idea where these two came from. What I do know, though, is that if ever I do see them again I am absolutely going to make sure they regret the day they were born.” Again, I raised my fist to make my point.

The hospital guy in the suit interrupted and said “I think that’s enough. If there is any more news, we’ll let you all know.”

The reporters all filed out, the young one stopping to tell me she was from the Stanford Daily and asked if she could talk to me sometime in the next few days.

“Sure,” I replied. “Just call first. I’m probably going to be here at the hospital for a while.”

The guy from Rolling Stone was waiting to talk, so I indicated he should follow me to the cafeteria.

“I can’t believe this happened,” he said, starting off. “I mean, it was just a few hours ago I saw her put in one of the most amazing performances I’ve seen in years, and now this?”

“Yeah,” I agreed, slumping down in a plastic chair and resting my elbows on the table. “Talk about highs and lows.”

“So, you seriously beat up two guys, at least one of which was armed?” he asked.

“Well, yeah. I mean, in a fair fight I would have been in trouble, you know, but they didn’t see me coming until too late. I just hit ‘em like a freight train and pounded the daylights out of ‘em.” I said, my voice sounding dead tired.

“That’s quite a story,” he said. “Have you had any kind of martial arts training or anything like that?”

“I kickbox,” I replied. “And I’m an athlete. I mean, I train and work out three hours a day, every day. I do weights and stuff, so I’m pretty strong.”

“Wow,” the guy said. “I guess they tangled with the wrong girl.”

“To tell you the absolute truth,” I said, looking him straight in the eye for emphasis. “I would have killed those guys for what they did to Emmy. No fucking around. Anybody that did what they did to her deserves to die.”

“You know what? I think I’m going to leave that out of my story,” he said, rising from his chair. “But I do hope that they get what they deserve.”

“Karma is a bitch,” I said, standing. “And so am I. If I ever see those two guys again...”

When I got back to Emmy’s room I was happy to see that she was awake.

“Hey, Em. How are you feeling?”

“Numb,” she replied. “I can barely feel anything at all,” she croaked, her voice hoarse.

"Well, that's good for now. You need your rest," I said, stroking her hair. "Just sleep as much as you can, baby. It's gonna take a little while for you to recover."

"How are you doing, Leah?" she asked, her voice still rough. "Are you O.K.?"

"I'm dealing," I answered. “I mean, physically, I'm fine. I'm still trying to process, but that'll come with time." To tell the truth, I was still way shaken up, but no way was I going to tell that to Emmy. She needed me to be strong for her, so that's what I was going to do.

"Thank you for saving me," Emmy whispered, taking my hand.

"Em, some things are worth fighting for," I said, as I leaned in to kiss the corner of her mouth that wasn't bruised and swollen. "And you are top of my list."