There was a small sound as the girl hit the ground. She rolled, and then slammed her body into a wall. She had not fallen straight forward, but rather, very far to the right, and she did not appear to be getting up.

The boy turned, his ice blue eyes, usually so calm, flickering over her weak form. Blood was pooling around her hips. She didn't bother whimpering. She didn't expect to be rescued, and besides, she wasn't going to die a sniveling pup. It would give those boy's too much pleasure to know she'd died so...girlishly.

Many boys would have looked upset or regretful and then run on. He could hear the sounds of the guards distinctly as they came after the two, shouting about finding a blood-pool some two blocks distant...maybe five, the walls could bounce sound so well this time of night. Many boys would have run on, and recounted later on in life that it was sad, but it had been impossible to save her.

But no. She'd stood by him, protected him...taken a dagger for him. He could not leave her, if for no other reason than she had done that. You didn't leave people like that to die.

He turned back swiftly, kneeling by the girl and pushing her jet black hair away. Her pale face was twisted in pain, and she looked like she was shaking. She was, he knew, from his gentle but firm grip on her shoulder.

"Elizabeth, we have to move..."

"I can't...I just can't..." she whispered, her features softening slightly. He noticed the tears running down her cheeks. They were tears of pain. She couldn't make a noise, it would be too demeaning. But she could cry. "Just go...they can't catch you...you're a damn good one on the roofs," she muttered, chuckling softly.

She's lost a lot of blood...I have to get her somewhere soon...

"Elizabeth, I'm not leaving without you. Now, get up."

His voice was cold, but at the same time, it encouraged. She looked at him, her grass-green eyes misty and yet...there was not only fire, but iron in her eyes. A will to live, or take as many down with her as possible. He held back a smile, for her benefit.

The girl slowly stood. Her straight black hair was snarled in places, matted with blood in others. Mostly other peoples.

"Come on then...before your magic wears off," she hissed, and he held back another smile as she started a quick sprint. The guards had to be only a few streets back now...

"Come...we need to get off the main streets. I know a low warehouse we can get onto."

He was surprised to find it was her addressing him. She was panting, nearly stumbling now. But every time she stumbled, she caught herself before she fell, righted herself, and plowed on, actually out-distancing him if he wasn't thinking for even a second.

He followed her through the narrow alleys, both silent unless she took a sudden turn and he nearly tripped over her, at which point he usually ended up catching her, and steadying her shaking form.

In the end, they were just outside the Shades, and the boy knew she was beginning to fail. She had been going on adrenaline and willpower, but she needed to rest, she needed to be bandaged. And he knew one man who would do it, few questions asked...

"Elizabeth...just a few more streets. I know someone who can help," the boy murmured, and he coaxed her up from the wall for one last sprint. She followed his lead without question, and he was surprised to see the blue on her hands. She really was losing a lot of blood...looking back, he saw that the place she had stopped had a small puddle. This close to the Shades, not a problem. Luckily.

The boy pounded on the door, and after a moment, a very quick moment, the man answered.

"Dr. Lawn?"

"Yes?"

"I need you to take care of her...I can pay you for the trouble."

The pox doctor opened the door and admitted them. The boy was now carrying the girl, who was now shivering and complaining about the cold. Uncharacteristic concern flickered on the boy's face before he turned to Lawn. The doctor motioned to a room, and the boy laid her out on a table.

Impatiently the boy waited for Lawn to look her wounds over. He insisted on staying, though he had to admit, the network of scars and the fresh stab wound on her torso made anger flare in him. She had been a Scholarship Kid. But she'd been better than him at defending herself. To see her scars only reminded him of the times she hadn't been able to do so.

Lawn sighed, and shook his head.

"Will she live?"

There was uncharacteristic shortness in the boy's tone, but even worse, there was concern. He was letting a weakness show. Forget it, he thought. She took a damned dagger for me, I can be concerned.

"It's certainly not good...she'll be out for a day or two...what's her name?"

"Why do you need to know?" the boy snapped.

"Because if she dies, I want to be able to tell her family."

"She doesn't have any. Her family died."

"I see. I need her first name then, so that she doesn't kill me when she realizes I've seen her naked."

There was a long pause as the boy looked over the girl on the bed – Lawn had moved her, for comfort. The long black hair, now washed but still matted and snarled, the pale face, murmuring in her unconscious state. The red lips, so thin and frail-looking. Her delicate features – he hadn't realized how frail she always seemed, her attitude had always made up for it. She was about his height, and she...she had a wonderful body. Perfectly curved, a good chest. And yet...her muscles and callouses suggested her line of work. Hands calloused from five or six years of clutching a dagger, muscled legs and arms from the running and hanging onto the walls.

"Her name's Elizabeth. Might I stay? I think she'll be more inclined to stay and get better if I'm here when she awakes."

"I have a spare room. Five dollars a week, and believe me, you'll be here a week."

The boy nodded, and when dismissed so the man could work, nodded silently and then slipped upstairs. He heard the doctor murmuring until he got to the room upstairs, where there were no sounds from behind the door. That was a relief. Her quiet moans of pain had been bothering him.

Shaking his head as he opened the door, the boy slipped over to the bed and removed his black Assassin's coat and boots, and then his trousers. His shirt and drawers he left on, just in case.

His blue eyes stared at the wall for some time before he let them drift closed. Let them think what they wanted. His relationship with Elizabeth D'Angelo was strictly a friendship...a close one, granted, but it was not romantic.

Slowly, the boy leaned back into the pillows and pulled the blankets over him. His slight frame was wiry and tall, and his features equine and gaunt. But handsome, in their own way. Just as hers were equine and thin, but very pretty, beautiful even, perhaps. At seventeen, he was quiet and polite. Especially to women. Even female Assassins had his respect and polite tongue.

The blue eyes closed and stayed that way, even though he was awake much of the night. He fell asleep shortly before dawn. But his mind was plagued with thoughts of his friend's death. If there was one person he could trust with nearly everything, it was her. He had no fears of her ever betraying him, and this latest show of loyalty and trust from her was proof of that.

With those thoughts sitting primly in the forefront of his brain, Havelock Vetinari slipped into sleep.