Thank you nari nick for reviewing, the only one who did. Either this is a smaller fandom than I thought, or people just don't like reviewing. But thanks for reading anyway. Onward!

Disclaimer: Having said it in the first chapter already, you know I don't own it. This is the last time I'm saying it in this story.

"Kitty, are we actually doing anything, or are we just wandering around?" the djinni beside her complained.

Kitty sighed in a way that didn't usually suit her; it was too sad and thoughtful. The Egyptian boy perked up. "What is it?"

"Well, this is the two years anniversary of, well, you know…" He'd better—the Demon Revolt, it was being called, but they knew it better as the day Nathaniel died. "I thought we could go visit the monument they set up a couple weeks ago. You know, for him."

Bartimaeus looked at her with a tenderness that rarely graced his features as she concluded awkwardly and looked away. He brushed her arm gently, and when she looked over, he rolled his eyes jokingly. Being gentle was not usually something the djinni would do for anyone else, of course, but over the last two years, girl and djinni had fallen in love. When Bartimaeus had gone as far to call it a real-life remake of Swans of Araby, she'd fed him a knuckle sandwich. He hadn't said anything that tactless since.

"Fine. Let's go to Natty-boy's monument." He sounded exasperated, but she knew better. Anything they did together was okay by both of them.

But the monument, which they hadn't taken time to see before then, frankly wasn't all it cracked up to be.

"This is terrible," Kitty whispered. "Who made this thing?"

The monument was a statue of John Mandrake. That was the first problem. The image set in stone held no resemblance to the boy Nathaniel she'd come to know in those last hours—it was John Mandrake one hundred per cent: the same hideous suit design, the same military haircut, the same ambition and arrogance and snobbishness all rolled into one plastered on his face, complete with a smirk and Gladstone's staff. A plaque at the bottom of the statue read, John Mandrake: Savior of London. Kitty could have taken a chisel to it. John Mandrake wasn't the "Savior of London", Nathaniel was.

"Nathaniel would have hated this statue," Kitty whispered.

"And yet it would have made John Mandrake strut around like a turkey the day before Thanksgiving," the djinni pointed out. He gave the statue an irritated glare. "Plus, we're not even here."

"But he wasn't always John Mandrake," she said sadly, "and we stayed out of the official story on purpose, remember?" She gazed at the statue with something nearing nostalgia.

The wistfulness in her expression made Bartimaeus a tad uncomfortable. "Well," he said, "Natty-boy isn't gonna care too much about that statue anyway, seeing as he's gone, and you have me, don't you?"

Kitty smiled at the thinly veiled cry for attention. She gave the Egyptian boy at her side a sly look out of the corner of her eyes. He was in Ptolemy's form, as usual, but for her convenience he added several inches to his form's height. It made it a good deal less awkward to seem a couple in public.

She gave his cheek a peck. "Yes, I do have you. Do you want to go to a restaurant and put mean ol' attention-stealing Nathaniel out of your head?"

Bartimaeus grinned. "As a matter of fact, I do."

She rolled her eyes, but a smile lurked at the corner of her mouth.


"Do you mind when we go to restaurants, since you can't eat human food and all?" Kitty asked with her mouth full. She wasn't one much for manners.

The djinni lounged back in his booth seat across from her and seemed to think. "Well, no. You eat whatever I order anyway, so I don't think the restaurant minds either. Plus, it's amusing watching you eat."

Kitty swallowed her food and glared at him. "Amusing? Excuse me?"

"Perhaps I should have said 'refreshing'," he corrected himself. Her glare softened a little. "You get all those magicians who eat too much or too little depending on how they want to look and how they want others to view them, and then you get people like you, who just eat when they're hungry. As I said, refreshing."

"You certainly hold magicians in the highest contempt," she noted.

"Of course. I've only ever trusted two humans ever, and only one of them was a magician. Heck, he didn't even deserve to be called one."

"So if one was a magician, I wonder who the other was," Kitty mused jokingly.

"A certain beautiful commoner," Bartimaeus informed her confidentially, leaning across the table toward her.

Kitty smirked. "Stop flirting and let me eat," she told him, bopping him on the nose with her fork.

He screwed his eyes shut and his nose seemed to steam a little. "Silver fork," he said.

"Oops," she responded, unrepentant.


Just after they left the restaurant, someone tugged at Kitty's shirt.

"Excuse me, Miss."

Kitty turned around. Behind her was a young girl, a child, really. She was blond with big blue eyes that glanced nervously to the Egyptian boy beside Kitty almost constantly.

"Miss, you're a magician, right?" the little girl squeaked.

"What makes you think that?" Kitty asked her kindly.

The girl gulped. "Th-the demon with you, Miss."

Kitty looked over at Bartimaeus, who was standing innocently in Ptolemy's form. There wasn't anything odd about that, so how had the girl been able to tell? Then she realized.

"Can you see demons?" The djinni behind her made an indignant sound at the phrasing, but Kitty ignored him. The blond girl nodded vigorously.

"Yes, Miss. That's why they chose me for this job."

"Job?" Kitty asked, quirking an eyebrow.

"I'm supposed to find magicians and give them a message. They said they'd pay me, and since Daddy died in the Demon Revolt…" The girl gulped. "Mommy can't get enough, so I'm helping."

Kitty could feel her heart go out to the little girl. She glanced at Bartimaeus to gauge his reaction to her. He seemed largely unaffected, so she figured the little girl was genuine, not some spirit or other.

"Here," she said, pulling some coins from her pocket and handing them to the little girl. "You need these more than I do."

The girl's eyes widened at the sight. A bright smile lit up her face and her head bobbed up and down several times.

"Thank you, Miss, very much! But now I need to give you the message."

Kitty almost told her that she wasn't a magician, but she saw the glance Bartimaeus gave her and realized that this was a good chance to find out if the magicians were planning something. She nodded for the little girl to go ahead with her message and leaned down as the little girl motioned so she could whisper it in her ear.

"The Demon's Tankard, seven o'clock tonight. This is the last day. Don't bring any of your demons past Sailor's Way—we'll have watchers. A new dominance will be shown. Come for revenge."

The little girl backed away. "Did you get all that?"

Kitty nodded slowly. "Yes. I did. Thank you." She smiled at the little girl. "I hope you and your mother make it through."

The little girl gave a grin. "Thank you, Miss. I hope we do too." She walked away, carefree and nearly skipping, unaware of the potential of the content in her message.

"So, what'd she say?" Bartimaeus asked. Kitty told him and he raised an eyebrow. "Demon's Tankard, eh? Pretty shady place. Are you planning on going for this so-called revenge?"

She shook her head. "Not for the revenge. I'm going to go to see what those magicians are up to. Will you come, at least until Sailor's Way?"

"Sure thing. I'd never let you go alone."

"Alright. Be aware that we might need to leave a little early."

"You mean a stylishly desperate escape?" the djinni grinned, and she saw that he'd sharpened Ptolemy's teeth for effect. "Sounds like my kind of thing."

"Good. We have a magician's party to crash tonight."


Kitty looked at her watch and let out a curse. It was already seven fifteen. "We're late."

"I told you we should have flown, but no, we take the bus that goes about three inches an hour," the fly buzzed in her ear.

"I've had enough of your flying for a lifetime," Kitty quipped, referring to when Bartimaeus had kidnapped her on Nathaniel's orders.

"You could've given it another shot, Kitty, I've lived with it for five thousand years."

"And I don't know how you managed that," she muttered to the fly.

"Skill," he explained cockily.

"Luck," she countered.

"Sailor's Way bus stop!" called the driver.

"That's me." Kitty stood up and got off the bus. The fly buzzed out just as the doors closed again.

"Are the other spirits here?" Kitty asked the Egyptian boy suddenly walking next to her.

"Yup, about half a block ahead. You go on to The Demon's Tankard. Ironic name, wouldn't you say? Since they're not letting the demons themselves in?"

She ignored his rambling. "Bartimaeus, stay here and try not to get yourself in trouble. I might need you."

"Might? I'd say it's a definitely," he corrected.

Kitty ignored him again and continued walking.


As she approached the derelict tavern that was The Demon's Tankard, she saw the same little blond girl who'd given her the message.

"They're asking everyone to go around back, Miss."

Kitty nodded to her and walked around to the back door of the tavern. The moment she opened it, she realized that this shambling old place was not exactly what it seemed. Yes, the insides were dark and dusky. Yes, there were servers giving out drinks. But there most similarities to a tavern ended. There were small, round tables throughout the room with neat white tablecloths. There were chairs around, but there were so many magicians—Kitty hadn't even known there were this many left alive, but somehow she suspected that this wasn't all of them—that most had to stand crammed together like sardines in a can. There was a short stage at the front of the room and on it stood a magician in a pentacle. He was speaking, something about demons and summonings and—dead people? But Kitty wasn't really listening. She was staring at the creature in the other pentacle.

It was a boy—well, a spirit in disguise as a boy, wearing a simple loincloth. He was several years younger than herself, dark-skinned, and looked about as frightened as a rabbit. His body was discolored by the purple of new bruises and the yellow of fading ones and his body was beat up enough to have been run over by a steam roller. He had a black eye and a split lip, and his dark, longish hair dangled limply. She wondered why the spirit didn't change its appearance to something else, something a little less beat up.

The magician barked an order to the boy in a different language. Kitty watched as, with fear in his eyes, the boy edged away from the magician and closer to the crowd.

"He is real! Touch him! Make him bleed! I do not lie to you!" the magician crowed.

The boy had reached the fringes of the crowd; they grabbed him and pulled him in like a wild animal, and Kitty lost sight of him.

For several minutes, the magician ranted about "bringing back the age of a magician dominance of London" with their "improved army" while a majority of the magicians there couldn't even hear him. They were shouting in excitement and triumph, and as Kitty stood by the door, she wondered what it was about.

Then she saw the boy again. He was near her in the crowd, the magicians shoving him this way and that, all wanting to touch him to see if he was really there. Suddenly, one of the magicians struck him hard in the face with a fist, and those around gasped as they saw the boy's face bloodied. He swayed, as if the force of the blow was going to knock him out.

"He does bleed! How!" one cried.

Kitty felt distinctly sick at the display of cruelty and morbid curiosity. The boy was shoved directly to her and at the close up look at his face, she realized that the fear she saw was nothing short of terror.

Suddenly, Kitty realized she didn't care if she found out anymore about this magician rebellion, so long as she could save the boy—even if he was a spirit. Her hand shot out almost of its own violation and latched onto his wrist. For the first time, he cried out and tried to pull away, but she jerked him forward with her as she sprinted out of the tavern in a blur, dragging the boy behind her.

It was several moments before the magicians seemed to notice, piling out the back door after her, drunk on the ideas that the magician on the stage had apparently been feeding them and determined to get the girl that had taken their focus point.

The boy kept stumbling, almost making them both fall over. He seemed on the very brink of unconsciousness. Kitty ran towards Sailor's Way, hoping that they'd be able to make it to where Bartimaeus would be waiting…

Something swooped down and grabbed them from behind. Kitty screamed as she and the boy were suddenly lifted into the air until she heard the voice above her:

"Kitty, you scream like a girl. Oh wait, you are one, aren't you?"

"You are so lucky I can't get at your face right now, buster," she snarled at Bartimaeus. She glanced over at the boy, who hadn't bothered even struggling as they'd been picked up. Then she realized he was unconscious. Poor thing.

"Bartimaeus, land us at my apartment. Maybe we can clean the kid up and figure out what this is all about."

Bartimaeus ducked his head to look at the boy and whistled. "The kid's so beat up his own mother wouldn't recognize him! What's he been up to, anyway?"

The sick feeling settled back in Kitty's stomach. "I don't think you want—" She cut off in a scream as, after a quick, sickly slicing sound, Bartimaeus began plummeting to the ground.

The djinni cushioned their landing with his body, his wing limp to the side. He moaned. "Silver. They got my wing with silver… I think it was an foliot with a spear. Embarrassing."

"Let me see the wing," Kitty demanded. He obediently flopped the injured wing into her lap. The feathers were askew and there was a neat, 3-inch-wide hole from which a clear substance leaked—essence. "Ouch," she murmured.

"Not too bad, actually. Give me a few minutes and I'll get us—"

Kitty's world was a blur of feathers for a moment as he cut off and shoved her to the side. She heard him cry out and saw the silver hilt imbedded in his stomach. He moved his beak to pull it out, but stopped, unable to bring himself to willingly touch the harmful silver aura. He leaned his head away from it. "Ow, ow, ow…"

Kitty yanked it out for him and he slumped in relief. "That was a pretty direct hit," he commented almost conversationally. "Might be more than a few minutes."

She made a split-second decision. "I'm sending you back."

Bartimaeus stared at her, tearing his attention away from his essence-leaking belly. "Come again?"

"I'm dismissing you. You need to heal. I'll summon you in three days."

"Kitty—"

She didn't listen to him. She stammered out the words of dismissal while picking up the dark-skinned boy, and by the time she'd hidden in a warehouse less than a block away, despite his protests, the djinni was long gone.

And so you there you have it, the source of the title, While You Were Dying. A lot can happen in three days, after all. There's also another hidden meaning, but I can't explain that one just yet.

Thanks for reading, it makes my day when I get reviews! No, really, it makes me glow! ^_^

-Rydd Rider