Roses Are Red

Summary: Hi. I'm Faith Isabella de Silva. Interesting name, not? Yeah, well, I'm not your average girl. My mom's the most powerful shifter around, and my dad (who my friends allllwaaays drool over-eew!) is pretty high up there on the mediator totem pole. So, what did I get from them? OK, a) I'm a shifter. And b) Thanks to being a mediator/shifter hybrid, I'm a "special" kind of shifter. I mediate vampires.

Chapter Two: The Art of Persuasion

A knock came at the door that evening. Sighing, with a hunch at who it was, I answered.

A thin, waifish, but nevertheless pretty girl stood in my doorway. She looked twelve or thirteen, and had porcelain skin with whitish blonde hair and hazel eyes.

"Hello, Faith," She said in her high voice. Unlike Magnus's, it was unaccented. "May I see Nick?"

"Oooh, Nick," I called in my best older sister voice.

He ran downstairs. But as soon as he saw the girl, his face fell.

"Oh. Hey, Giselle."

I left my brother to talk to the young vamp, but as I walked upstairs, a thought struck my mind. Vamps did need to be mediated.

And one of those vampires was Giselle McTavish.

000

Yeah, I feel guilty for not telling my parents that it was that Giselle. And I feel worse for CeeCee and Adam. Their only kid, a newly bitten vampire.

But some things can't told.

I was actually there the night Giselle was bitten. So was Nick. You see, Slade, a desperate vamp who wanted our help, took us to an alley. Little did we know that Giselle had followed us.

"Look," I sighed, "Slade, Nick and I, we're sorry, but we aren't into that whole thing. We want to be normal, you know?"

Slade turned to us, eyes burning red.

"No," He spat, "I don't know how you can just leave me to dwell like this. A living Hell!"

He took a threatening step toward Nick. Just as I was getting ready to kick him where it hurt, a nervous but determined voice came.

"No! Don't hurt him!"

Giselle hopped out of the shadows. For a moment, there was silence. Nervous, shy, crushing-on-my-brother Giselle McTavish had come to help us?
But then... Slade got that look in his eyes. He was upon Giselle in a matter of seconds, holding her struggling body in his arms.

"Giselle!" Nick cried, but it was too late.

I watched, petrified in horror as Slade's elongated fangs sank into her neck.

Giselle's last dying scream of terror rang into the night.

The blood flowed, and for a moment, Nick and I did nothing. But then, we got on Slade, clawing at him, punching him, but it was no use. He was draining every drop of blood from the girl's body.

Finally, Slade hurled her body to the ground, and turned to us. Giselle's blood ran from his mouth, and he gave us a gruesome grin.

"Now you know what shall happen if you do not help me next time."

And with that, he was a bat flying off into the night.

Nick and ran to Giselle's still body. I shook her at the shoulders, yelling her name. She shook back and forth, limp. Her eyes were still open in horror, but there was no spark in them.

And her throat...

Slade had put all of his hunger into this job. Giselle's throat was practically torn open. The little color she had had in her delicate skin was gone.

Nick's hand went to her hair, which was spread around her.

"She's dead."

Suddenly, a horrifying thought struck me.

"No. Not exactly."

000

Nick and I took Giselle's body to our shed in the back yard, and waited. In the morning, she still lay there, so we covered her body, wrapped it up, and hid it.

Going to school, we prayed that she wouldn't wake up.

By the time we came home, she still wasn't awake, so I wondered of she would ever wake up. But as soon as the sun went down...

Giselle's body twitched. Her throat began to close up, leaving only a small scar.

And slowly, she blinked.

"Giselle?" Nick asked.

Her head was raised, and she looked around, unblinkingly. She would have screamed, but the shed was dark.

"What happened?" She muttered, touching her throat. Then, she came upon the scar.

And screamed.

000

"Faith?" I turned at that British accent.

"Great. You again."

Magnus glared at me. I was in the alley where... it happened. He had probably followed me.

" asked you nicely for your help."

"Well, Barney, sometimes manners don't work." I shrugged my shoulders, trying to get my bookbag in a more comfortable position. I hate the fact that this place is on my walk home from school.

Magnus walked up to me. "That bookbag seems to be bothering you. Let me help."

His hands brushed against my shoulders as he took the bookbag off my shoulders. I shivered.

"Hey. I never said yes."

Magnus smiled. "But you were thinking it."

Not!

OK, maybe I had, but I'm not confirming it.

"Whatever."

"You have very silky hair," Magnus remarked, twirling his fingers in it. "Hispanic. From your father, am I right?"

How the heck...?

"Are you a stalker?" I asked suspiciously.

"No," Magnus replied, still inspecting my very silky hair. Why was he doing that?

And more importantly... why did I like it?

I felt his breath against my skin. Icy cold.

My hand went up and took his arm. His cold skin.

"Magnus," I said nervously, "Go."

His voice whispered in my ear.

"But you don't want me to. You're wish is my command, m'lady."

I twisted my head around to him, about to say something that, according to Magnus, I probably didn't mean.

But then... I saw his eyes.

Those beautiful twin sapphires. They sparkled. Caught me up in them...

No! He was luring me in with that vampire thing... the whole pheremones attraction thing...

"Faith," Magnus murmured to me, "Remember. You are immune to that attraction. As a vampire shifter. Anything you feel is-"

"No," I said firmly.

"I can give you whatever you want if you help me," He smiled, "Anything."

"I don't want anything from you," I hissed.

"Oh, really. Then I guess you don't want help defeating Slade."

000

So? R and R! I love Magnus...