Chapter Text
Marcus Darrison was nine years old when he first ran from home. It was December, two weeks and one day before Christmas, the axis of the winter months for third graders and the rainbows of cheap electric lights were strewn across the cookie cutter worker’s housing. The bright green and red and yellow bulbs lit provided what little light illuminated the runaway. He was small for his age, his thin form draped in a ratty yellow t-shirt and a twice thrifted black sweatshirt that reeked with the acrid scent of cigarette smoke. On his legs were stretched and worn cheap black sweatpants and on his feet were a pair of velcro sneakers that were visibly too small. His Thomas the Train backpack rattled with cans that he couldn’t open and sloshed with soda and water already half frozen. His eyes darted from left to right, scouring the desolate streets, jumping at any car that passed, feeling their eyes watch him as they rode past. He heard another engine roar closer. He stared dead ahead. Reflected in the window of a withering duplex were the distant flashing red and blue lights of a police car. Their sirens are off, he thought, continuing his march forward that means they don’t see me. The car slowed down an imperceptible amount. Almost imperceptible. Marcus noticed. He began to speed up. Now the car was speeding up. So did Marcus. The sirens turned on. Marcus began to run, his too tight shoes jamming into his toes with every step, his backpack furiously bobbing up and down like a buoy left in rough seas. The car kept getting closer, its sirens louder. Marcus swore he could hear the engine rumbling like a caged beast, waiting to grab him up off the streets and bring him back. He couldn’t go back. Not now. He kept sprinting, the frigid December air flowing down his nostrils. The road led him to the banks of a river. There was a wide patch of short brown grass and dirt that ran parallel to the river and the road which terminated abruptly at a sheer concrete wall that served as a barrier between land and the water. Far to Marcus’s right was a bridge that arched plainly over the river, leaving a small space where one could walk on the sheer wall underneath the bridge. Marcus dashed across the street and sprinted across the expanse of dirt and weeds that could be optimistically be called grass. He reached the bridge and carefully edged his way underneath it. The wall was only a few feet wide and ended with a five foot drop into the freezing river below. Carefully Marcus sat down, letting his feet dangle off the edge and began to cry. Between his sobs he heard a voice.
“ Why are you crying?”. Marcus looked up and through his tear blurred eyes he saw a woman, tall and beautiful with long blonde hair dressed in a fine brown coat with a white fur collar floating several feet above the water. Marcus recoiled and raised his hand as if he was a crossing guard ordering the floating woman to halt. He sniffled loudly and yelled
“ I’M A MAGE! YOU DON’T SCARE ME.” he said between several more loud sniffles. The woman laughed a high pitched, yet genuine, laugh.
“ Really?” she said, over pronouncing every syllable as if she had just discovered the word and found it the most interesting thing she could have said. “ You seem very scared right now.”
“ NO I’M NOT.” Marcus yelled while actively shaking “ I CAN CAST SPELLS!” the woman cocked her head.
“ That sounds very interesting, do you mind showing me one?” Marcus nodded cautiously and put his hands together.
“ Vitam vobis do, flowes.” he whispered. Lines of turquoise light flashed along his arms. When they disappeared he opened them to find a small daisy between his palms. The woman clapped excitedly at the amateurish display of magecraft.
“ That’s so…” She stopped for a moment at an apparent loss for words. “cool!” Marcus’s heart swelled with pride though fear still lingered in his mind. “ Though you do know you aren’t supposed to show magecraft to people?”
“ Aren’t you magic too?” The woman again laughed her strange, high laugh.
“ One could say that.”
“ Are you also a…” Marcus quickly glanced around. “Mage?” The woman shrugged.
“ Not quite.”
“ Then what are you?” The woman stopped for a second and gazed off into the distance, deep in thought.
“ Something that you don’t know about yet. Though I’d prefer if you keep thinking of me as a woman floating above a river.”
“ Why are you here? My mom always tells me there's nothing in this town for mages. ” The woman flashed Marcus a charming smile.
“ I’m just here looking for someone important. Enough with the questions now. Aren’t you cold?” It was only now that Marcus realized how cold he really was and how he had already started to shiver. “ I’ll take that as a sign. Here, have this.” She handed Marcus a drastically too large brown leather bomber jacket.
“ Is this…mine now?”
“ For now. I’ll send my daughter to come get it eventually but hopefully that won’t have to be for a long time.” Marcus’s eyes glowed as he slung the jacket over his shoulders.
“ Thank you Ma’am, I...” The woman was gone, in her place now was only the shadow of the bridge and the cold December air. Marcus heard the sounds of a car door slam above him and boots crunching against the dirt to either side of him. He rose to his feet, trying to find a way out only to see that either exit was blocked by a police officer. The first one to speak was the one on the right. A tall and skinny man with a five o’clock shadow and a poorly bleached buzzcut.
“ You’ve had one night, ain’t ya Marcus.