The Dark Rose

By darkmagickwillow

Copyright © May 2003

Chapter 17 (Dawn of Darkness)

Holding Willow's hand, Tara walked up the stairs to her dorm room. They were unusually quiet as they came back from lunch so Tara could pick up her books for her next class; Tara hadn't figured out what to tell Willow about her visions of yesterday. She was glad that the silence hadn't bothered Willow, who seemed to be happy simply being in Tara's company. She wasn't sure how to answer questions about her unusual quietness.

A tall, slender woman in her thirties with short, sleek brown hair stood leaning against Tara's door. She had the relaxed attitude of someone who'd been waiting for some time and was content to wait some more. As they approached Tara's room, the woman straightened up, her face brightening. "Tara! Willow!" she exclaimed.

Before Tara could respond, the woman swept her up in a tight embrace. "It's unbelievably wonderful to see you, Tara." She pulled away from Tara, holding her out at arm's length, and looked closely her. Suddenly she seemed embarrassed. "I'm sorry," she said. "You don't know who I am, do you?"

"You're Dawn," Tara said slowly, the hesitation in her voice revealing her lack of complete certainty about the identity of the young woman. So much time had passed. Dawn was no longer the young teenager she'd seen in the past. Yet somehow this made the past more real than it had before with Willow's unchanging appearance. "But you're right," she said. "I don't really know who you are."

Willow felt a deep sadness as she watched their reunion. She and Dawn had once been close, but she had forfeited any right to Dawn's respect much less her love. Perhaps she might have been able to achieve a reconciliation if she'd returned before Buffy's death, but now was certainly too late.

Before Willow could say anything, Dawn hugged her too. "Willow," she said. "It's so good to see you again too."

Willow stiffened in surprise before relaxing and welcoming Dawn with her own embrace. "Dawnie," she murmured softly. She ran Dawn's words through her head again, trying to believe that Dawn had really said what she thought she heard.

When they parted, both women's eyes were wet with tears. "It's Dr. Dawn now," Dawn smiled.

"I knew you'd do well," Willow smiled in return. Then her face fell as she recalled how they'd parted. "Dawn, I'm-"

Dawn shook her head. "No sorries," she interrupted, her face full of firm resolve. "Not when I'm so happy to see both of you again," she added gently.

Tara watched as the expression on Willow's face transformed from one of resigned regretfulness to one of almost shocked happiness. She felt happy at Willow's happiness, but also guilty for she had been the source of all the time and distance between them.

Turning to Tara Dawn said, "Now, Tara, what did you mean when you said you didn't really know me?"

Tara swallowed, feeling self-conscious as both Willow's and Dawn's eyes focused on her. "Um, I've seen you in my ... dreams, and I knew we knew each other in the past, but that's all." She relaxed when Willow nodded, apparently accepting her explanation. Tara continued, "I hate to say this, but I've got to get to class. I really want to talk to you though!"

"It's okay," Dawn said, patting Tara's arm reassuringly. "Can we meet here after class to do dinner?"

"Sure," Tara smiled. She opened her door to get her books, then turned her head to ask Dawn, "Do you want to wait inside? I'll be back around 5."

"No," Dawn said. "I'll just meet you here at 5."

Tara nodded, then disappeared into her room to get her books. Dawn and Willow glanced at each other uncomfortably, each of them unsure of what to say next.

Dawn gazed down at the floor, then looked back up at Willow before speaking. "How much does she remember?" she asked.

"I'm not quite sure," Willow said. She shifted her weight uncomfortably, looking away from Dawn. "More than I expected."

Tara emerged from her room, books in hand. She beamed at Willow and Dawn. "I'll see you tonight." She wanted a goodbye kiss from Willow, but she was too nervous to kiss her in front of Dawn so she settled for a quick hug.

They watched Tara walk away until she was out of sight. Both of them looked down, uncertain how to be with each other after so much time apart.

Dawn scuffed her shoe along the trim by the door. "How-" she began.

"Did she come back?" Willow finished for her. She shook her head. "I don't know, but it wasn't me despite all my efforts." She shrugged, trying to hide the fact that it bothered her that she didn't know. "Fate I suppose."

Another awkward silence fell on them, neither of them looking at the other. Willow broke this one, asking "How did you know she was back?"

"Giles called me," Dawn said, relieved to have something easy to talk about. "I came on the first flight."

"Have you seen him?" Willow asked warily. She hoped Dawn hadn't had much of a chance to talk with Giles about her. This meeting with Dawn was going so much better than the one with Giles, and she didn't want to lose Dawn too.

"No," Dawn said. "I came directly here. I don't think I really believed it until I saw her." She smiled at Willow, certain that Willow would understand what she was feeling. "It was hard enough believing that you were back in Sunnydale. Where were you all those years?" she asked, an expression of intense curiosity on her face as she looked at Willow.

"Dark places," she answered. "All over the world. Anyplace that might help me find Tara again, anyplace but Sunnydale where I found her." She looked at Dawn, her eyes full of regret. "I wish I'd come back sooner, not for Tara since she wasn't here yet, but to see you and Buffy before she-" Her voice caught in her throat.

Braving her fear of Willow's rejection, Dawn reached out and gently stroked Willow's cheek. "It's okay, Willow," she said. "What hurt most was knowing that you were still out there hurting."

"I can't believe you're so forgiving," Willow said ruefully. "My life has changed more in the last month than it has in years. It's so hard believing that she's real."

"It's weird seeing her younger than me," Dawn said. "I mean, she was like a mother to me. You too, for that matter."

"Not me." Willow shook her head, the corners of her mouth turning down. "I was too busy-"

"Keeping the world safer every night and learning how to bring my sister back from the dead," Dawn said defiantly.

"Like that worked out so well," Willow said glumly. She had ruined everything in her life in just a few months.

"But it did," Dawn said. She swept her arms out, her hands grasping the air as if she wanted to shake Willow out of her guilt. "You gave her 15 more years of life. Yes, the first was hard, but she treasured each and every one of those years. I did too. How could I be angry with you for returning my sister to me?"

"But the other things after Tara died," Willow argued, unable to bring herself to say what those things were. She felt that she deserved Dawn's hatred both for what she'd done and for what she'd almost done. She just didn't think that she'd have to work so hard to get it.

"It was a long time ago," Dawn said.

"But-" Willow objected.

"Let me finish," Dawn said firmly.

Reminded by her tone that Dawn was not a child any longer, Willow said, "Okay."

"You're family, Willow," Dawn said, looking steadily into Willow's eyes. "You and Tara both."

Under the cloudy night sky, Amy stood in the graveyard watching the Master. A terrible blight had fallen upon the once youthful immortal. He had become unnaturally old. His skin was wrinkled and spotted with age, and his eyes were sunken. His body was bent and his head bowed as if the Heart was laden with the weight of the world.

Wrapping both palsied hands around the Heart, he stoked the emerald fire with his malice until a sickly green radiance spilled out to illuminate the graveyard. As he pulled his hands away from the Heart, they were filled with green fire. He hurled the fire at the ground, slowly turning to burn a circle around him then filled it with more fire that seethed and flowed like a liquid. Finally he inscribed a pentagram within the circle, completing the mystical symbol.

His hands returned to the Heart to summon forth more of its might, causing the fires around him to leap higher and higher until he was hidden from view by an inferno of emerald flames. The fires grew and grew, tearing at the heavens with tongues of flame. With a final shout from the Master, the fire leaped into the sky like emerald lightning and pierced the clouds. The explosion of power blinded Amy for a moment.

When she could see again, she looked up and saw that the full moon now shone with an ill emerald radiance. Where the corrupt light struck the ground, the soil boiled and seethed. Soon the rotting hands of the dead could be seen clawing their way out of their graves. A growing stream of zombies emerged from the ground like unholy children being born until the graveyard was full of hundreds of the living dead animated by the evil force of the corrupted moon.

A travesty of a smile formed on the Master's wrinkled face as he surveyed his army of the dead. They stood silently watching him, their sunken sockets filled with emerald fire. With a savage gesture, he directed them towards town, and they began to shuffle in that direction. They needed no more instruction than that, for the dead hated the living and would kill them on sight.

Amy smiled as she watched the performance. The Heart was destroying the vampire as she had planned, and this spell might settle another account of hers tonight. She had been surprised to meet the reincarnation of Tara Maclay at her shop yesterday, but it had been obvious what she was after a few moments of thought. Willow had managed to bring her girlfriend back from the dead after all. There could be no other explanation. Fortunately, Tara hadn't appeared to remember her.

It didn't matter if she had tonight. If Willow was in town as Amy expected she was, the zombies would kill her. It wasn't as good as doing it herself, but one had to make sacrifices sometimes. Individually the undead weren't much, slow and uncoordinated as they were, but quantity had a quality all its own and they numbered in the thousands. While the emerald moon shone down on Sunnydale, all the dead that were more than dust would come back to life and kill the living.

All her problems would soon be over and when she had the Heart, her dark moon would shine down over the whole world.

After Tara and Dawn finished placing their orders at the counter, they picked a table. They were the only ones in the tiny restaurant at the moment, so they had their choice of tables. As they sat down, Tara gestured around the tiny room and explained, "I know it's not much to look at. I mean it's just Mr. Xing and his wok, but it's the best Chinese food in Sunnydale."

"You sure like food a lot," Dawn said, smiling at Tara's enthusiasm. "Do you do any cooking? You used to make the most wonderful pancakes in funny shapes." Dawn sounded nostalgic as she recalled her past with Tara, but she was also probing to see how much Tara remembered.

"Funny shaped pancakes?" Tara said, wrinkling her nose in puzzlement. "Why would anyone want funny shaped pancakes?"

"They taste better," Dawn said. Catching Tara's look of disbelief, she asserted, "Really, they did. No one could make them like you."

Tara regarded Dawn suspiciously. "I'm still not sure if I should believe you about the pancakes, but yes, I did cook, but there's not much of a place to do any cooking in the dorm." She folded her arms on the table and looked at Dawn seriously. "So how do you know me?"

Dawn accepted the change in mood gracefully. "Do you know who Buffy was?" she asked. When Tara nodded, she continued, "Buffy was my big sister." Dawn paused for a moment, considering whether to add more, then shook her head. It would just confuse Tara.

"Willow was Buffy's best friend. I met you after the two of you started dating. When Buffy-" Dawn looked down at her hands on the table. After a moment she returned her gaze to Tara and said, "When she died you and Willow moved in to take care of me. Buffy was my only family so you guys sort of became my moms. Willow would help me with my school work and stuff, but she was also busy leading the nightly patrols and filling in for Buffy that way."

"What about me?" Tara asked curiously, wondering how she had fit into this kind of family.

"You made us breakfast," Dawn said, "and you were always there to talk with me when I needed it." She smiled. "That summer I needed a lot of help. Willow faced the outside world, but you held us together as a family."

"I have a hard time seeing myself as your mom," Tara said with a crooked smile. Dawn reached across the table to take one of Tara's hands in hers. "I know I'm older now," Dawn said. "But I remember that you were there when I needed you most. If you ever need anything Tara." She re-emphasized the word, squeezing Tara's hand. "Anything. Just ask me."

"What was Willow like then?" Tara asked, leaning forward.

"She was smart and caring," Dawn answered. "And very much in love." She cocked her head to look inquisitively at Tara. "Was there something in particular you wanted to know about?"

"I've seen flashes ... visions of the past," Tara explained. She pulled her hands away from Dawn's and grasped at the air, reaching for the right words that she couldn't quite find to explain her connection to the past. "That's how I recognized you. But I ... it's not the same as actually experiencing it." She broke off and looked down at the white plastic surface of the table for a moment before looking up at Dawn. "Do you understand?"

"I think so," Dawn said with a nod. "But perhaps that's for the best." Noticing Tara's look of confusion, Dawn continued, "If you knew too much about the past, it would be difficult to maintain your own identity, to keep yourself separate from the Tara of the past."

"But-" Tara began.

"I know," Dawn said with an ironic smile. "I'm not helping with my promise that I'd do anything for you because of events you don't remember from that past. But there's a difference between acknowledging that the past happened and letting it become you."

"How do I find the right balance between knowing too much and not knowing enough?" Tara asked. She knew there was a difference, but she couldn't feel what it was to really understand where the boundaries were. She still felt like she didn't know nearly enough about what had happened in the past to make decisions about her future.

"Let it come to you naturally, gradually," Dawn said. "Don't try to force it. Your dreams are probably showing your past to you at a rate that you can assimilate. Trust them."

Tara looked guiltily at Dawn. "I cast a spell," she admitted.

An awkward silence followed as Mr. Xing brought them their food on styrofoam plates, placing the kung pao chicken in front of Dawn and a Szechuan dish with sauteed green beans and shrimp in front of Tara. He dropped off a bottle of soy sauce and a pair of chopsticks for each woman, then was gone, back behind his counter by the door to wait for the next customer. Tara expertly picked up one of the shrimp with her chopsticks and started to bring it up to her mouth.

"Wait!" Dawn said urgently, stopping Tara mid-motion.

"What?" Tara said, puzzled by Dawn's exclamation.

"You are ... were ... allergic to shrimp," Dawn said, hesitating on her choice of tense.

"I eat shrimp all the time," Tara said mildly, though she put the shrimp down. Pointing at Dawn's dish with her chopsticks, she added, "Peanuts are another matter. I can't eat them at all."

"How about chocolate?" Dawn asked, curious about the differences between the old Tara and the new Tara.

"Chocolate's fine," Tara said with a lopsided smile. "More than fine. It's wonderful."

"Cool," Dawn said, looking for a moment like the teenager she had once been. "Then we can go out for one of our big movie and milkshake fun days." She smiled wryly. "Though you might have to be the one to drink the big milkshake now."

"That sounds fun," Tara said, her smile broadening. It already felt like she had known Dawn for years. "Did we used to do that often?" she asked, taking a bite of her food.

"Often enough," Dawn answered. "You started taking me out after Buffy died. Willow would be at work, or patrolling, or working on the Buffy bot."

"Buffy bot?" Tara interrupted.

"Um," Dawn fumbled for words, trying to figure out how to explain where the Buffybot came from, then decided it was best to just ignore the whole issue. "It was a robot someone built that looked just like Buffy. Willow programmed it so that all the bad guys would still think the slayer was alive and so that the school and state would still think Buffy was my guardian. I wanted to stay with you and Willow instead of being sent to a foster home."

Tara reached across the table to squeeze Dawn's hand. "I'm sorry."

"Don't be," Dawn said with a smile. "You were a great mom."

Tara wasn't sure what to say to that. Dawn's compliment made her feel warm inside, but at the same time she knew that she certainly wasn't ready to be a mother at her age even if her past self had been. She covered her uncertainty by taking a few more bites of her green beans and shrimp.

"Anyway," Dawn continued, after she took another bite of her food too. "I'd be feeling depressed, or rebellious about summer school, and you'd take me out to a movie or lunch or something. You'd talk to me like I was a real person, not just a kid or ... something else."

"What else?" Tara asked, wrinkling her brow.

"I'll explain later. That's too long a story for now," Dawn answered with a smile, long ago having accepted her unique nature. "But first, I'd like to ask you about that spell you cast. What was it precisely? You didn't cast anything on Willow, did you?"

"No," Tara said quietly, shaking her head. Her smile faded. "I would never ... I just cast a spell to see my past ... Willow's past."

"That doesn't sound so bad," Dawn said, looking encouragingly at Tara.

"I-" Tara began as the door crashed open. A figure in a tattered gray suit stumbled into the little restaurant and tripped over one of the tables. Mr. Xing rushed out from behind the counter to investigate the commotion. The newcomer struggled to get up, pushing the table away. As Mr. Xing bent over him to help, the man lunged at this throat and bit deep.

Tara tore open her backpack to get her stakes while Dawn rummaged through her purse. Grabbing one of the stakes, Tara stood up and yelled at the figure, hoping to distract it from the kindly old man. It looked up at her with glowing emerald eyes, its mouth dripping with blood, and began to get up. The moment its chest became exposed, Tara hurled the stake deep into its heart with the full force of her mind.

Nothing happened. Her calm evaporated as the creature rose to his feet, oblivious to the stake piercing its heart.

"It's not a vampire, Tara! It's a zombie." Dawn grabbed at her arm. "Try for the head."

The sunken eyes gleamed with green fire as it stumbled towards them. Another of the creatures crashed through the door. Shreds of flesh still clung to half its face, but the other half was fleshless bone. A single lidless eye stared angrily at them from the ruined face.

Tara began to feel afraid. These creatures seemed even worse than vampires. But she took Dawn's advice and readied another stake. She threw this one with all her force into the head of the first zombie. Wood shattered bone with a loud crack. The zombie staggered back, but did not fall down. As it regained its balance, Tara saw black goo oozing from a gaping wound in its forehead, but the creature was no more concerned about its brain than its heart. Tara turned to Dawn, a look of panic in her eyes.

"We have to get out of here!" Dawn said.

"In the back!" Tara shouted as she ran to the back of the restaurant. Mr. Xing had an apartment above the restaurant. She just hoped the door was unlocked as the two zombies shambled after them. She pulled the door open so hard that it slammed against the wall.

Dawn pushed her through the doorway then followed her, closing the door behind them. Tara locked the door and then looked frantically about for something to brace it with, but there was nothing on the landing they stood on.

Stairs led both up and down. Dawn looked at Tara, asking, "Which way?"

Tara bit her lip as she quickly thought about the direction. "Up," she said. "I don't want to get trapped in the basement with no way out."

As they rushed up the stairs, they heard the zombies banging on the door behind them. After they reached the top, Dawn pushed open the door and once they were inside slammed it shut behind them, securing it with the deadbolt. Then they turned and looked around Mr. Xing's small apartment. Dawn spotted the old couch first.

"The couch," she said to Tara, pointing at it. Tara understood her immediately. The two women ran over to the couch and pushed it in front of the door. After adding a few chairs and a small table to the barricade, they were both breathing hard as they looked each other.

"Secure enough?" said Tara in an almost calm voice. With the immediate danger over, she was worried but not so frightened as she had been downstairs.

Dawn nodded and walked over to the window to look at the street below. Tara joined her and saw dozens of zombies walking around below. Most of the creatures were the decaying remains of the buried dead, but a few were clearly people the zombies had slain tonight. The full moon, livid with emerald ill, illuminated the hellish scene below.

A police cruiser had crashed into a parked car. Its doors were open and one officer was still halfway inside the car, but the unnatural angle of his neck showed that he was dead. A zombie was mindlessly smashing the head of the other officer into a brick wall again and again, not noticing or not caring that he was already dead. As Tara watched in horror, the policeman in the car twitched weakly then began moving more purposefully. He slowly extricated himself from the car and stood up, his head hanging at an impossible, drunken angle.

Before she could turn away, Tara saw Mr. Xing stagger out of the restaurant below them, his throat in ribbons of torn flesh and his glazed eyes sparkling with emerald hate. She turned to Dawn and said, "We need Willow," at the same time Dawn said, "We need Giles."

Only a month ago she would have said Giles too, but now her first thought of who to turn to was Willow. It wasn't that Willow was the best person to handle this, though she was. It was that Willow had become the most important person in her life. It had happened so quickly that she hadn't noticed exactly when her life had changed.

As Tara watched out the window for Willow to arrive, Dawn paced behind her. They hadn't been able to contact Giles directly, but Tara had talked to Spirit on her cell phone. She and Giles were on their way to the library for weapons and research materials. They said that the town was full of zombies, hundreds of them. Spirit had volunteered to come rescue them anyway, but Tara had told them to go on, that she and Dawn would meet them at the library after Willow arrived.

As Tara wondered where Willow was for the hundredth time, a bolt of blue fire shot down from above and incinerated one of the zombies. She looked up as more bolts rained down from the sky, tearing apart the undead with concussive force then consuming the remains with heat and fire.

Willow floated in the sky, azure fire pouring from her outstretched hands. She was an angel of destruction, beautiful and terrible. Her black cloak billowed around her as the wind tossed her fiery mane. Her face was calm and cool as marble as dark eyes flitted back and forth, finding target after target to destroy.

As Tara watched Willow, she couldn't stop herself from wondering how Willow could maintain such a prodigious expenditure of energy. Was she keeping her promise to Tara? Tara closed her eyes and took three deep breaths to calm her mind.

When her mind was as quiet as clear, still water, she relaxed and allowed her senses to extend beyond the merely physical so that she could feel the flows of life and magic around her. Then she re-opened her eyes and looked at Willow. She gasped in wonder at what she saw.

Willow was surrounded by a diaphanous, opalescent shell of bright energies made incandescent by a pulsing red glow from within. She trailed complex webs of crackling azure and gold energies like enormous gossamer wings. It was so beautiful.

Multicolored streams of power from life and nature flowed towards her from all directions, swirling into gyres of pure, white energy that poured directly into Willow. Her aura surged with brightness as the magic entered her then dimmed as she redirected the power, transmuting it into a conflagration of cleansing blue flame.

Amazed at what she'd seen, Tara peered deeper into Willow's aura. Beyond the swirling, semitransparent mist of glowing blue energies, she looked into the sunlike core of red power that pulsed with the beat of Willow's heart. Deeper and deeper she went, seeing the red shade gradually darker into an almost black color as she reached the very center.

At the center was an inner shell of sluggishly flowing blackness swirled with thin streams of blood red power. These magicks didn't react to what was happening above. They were a quiescent power, but their puissance was as great as that of the active brightness above.

Willow was shrouded with a penumbra of darkness.

Continued...