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| In Omne Tempus - In What Ethereal Dances by Holly (13 Reviews) | | - abc + + |  | | | Conclusive Notes: I can hardly believe it myself, but this is the last chapter. Thank you so much to everyone who read/reviewed/emailed regarding this story. You all have been an absolute delight, and that made the writing process itself all the more enjoyable. Thank you.
I’m going to say this now: I don’t have any plans for a sequel. That doesn’t mean there won’t be one, but as of now, my muse is hungry for other projects. However, having said that, I did leave certain things “unfinished” for a reason. I’ve changed very little in the course of translating my outline to story form: the fates of all the characters have remained as I planned from the beginning.
Once more, I have to thank my betas: Megan, Mari, Kimmie, Teri, and Yani. You ladies rock hard. Thank you for all the time you invested in this, and your patience with me in particular. I know I’m not always the easiest person to work with, as my own patience seems to always get the better of me.
Also, thanks to Mandi, Stacy and Noaluv for the lovely artwork made for this fic. You gals are the best!
A final thanks to Karbear57 for issuing the challenge to begin with. I don’t think I’ve ever been as taken in by a challenge as I was with this one. I remember I found it when I was already knee-deep in other projects, and I filed it away as a “must-do.” It was such a joy to write. Thank you.
As promised, the challenge guidelines are listed at the end of the chapter.
Chapter Thirty-Five
In What Ethereal Dances
The house that sat reliably at 1630 Revello Drive appeared strangely foreign against the sky behind it. Over the past few years, she had come to readily accept the place as home—the only home that didn’t feel false, even with the danger that nipped at her heels with every step. She remembered the house in Los Angeles as though it was a distant dream, even though it hadn’t been all too long ago that she called the place home. It wasn’t home, though. It had never been home.
Not like Sunnydale had. How perverse was she? Feeling safe on the mouth of hell.
Perhaps that simply meant that she was meant for this life, and truthfully, Buffy could live with that. This life had given her so much—almost enough to rival what it had stolen. Tonight, she was going home to her lover; her mate. The one the Powers had selected for her. The man she loved with every fiber of her being.
If nothing else, she had that. She had Spike. And Spike was all she truly needed. She could give or take the rest. As long as he was with her, there was no reason to want for anything.
Buffy exhaled and flexed her shoulders. She was exhausted but wired at the same time, and all she wanted right now was the comforting embrace of her lover and a night where she didn’t have to worry about the outcome of tomorrow. And to do that, she had to let go.
Let go of many, many things.
She started for the familiar tree outside her bedroom window before remembering that her mother was on the inside, and had been for quite some time. There was no need to sneak around, especially since she was moving into a new house with her boyfriend. Especially since she’d been told, in no uncertain terms, that there was no need to hide anymore, if there ever had been.
It felt strange coming home from a night of battle and walking up to the front door. She wondered for a minute if it would be appropriate to knock, then realized how silly she was being and snatched the spare key from the predictable hiding place under the potted plant. She had no idea how late it was, but wasn’t surprised to see her mother sitting on the staircase with an empty glass of wine in her hand and a worried look in her eyes.
Buffy smiled tightly to herself. She wondered how often her mom had wanted to do just this. How often she’d spent nights awake, waiting to hear her stumble into her bedroom. How often she’d wanted to cast pretenses aside and come clean with the secrets they kept from each other.
However, she knew that her mom’s decision was the right one. Had Joyce come to her before she was ready, they wouldn’t be where they were now. There wouldn’t be this golden understanding. The calling was hers, and she felt the sole responsibility to answer for it.
“Oh, thank God,” her mom said, rising to her feet. “I heard...there was all that terrible commotion outside earlier. I didn’t know—”
“You heard Angelus and Darla?”
“They weren’t exactly being discrete.” Joyce pressed a hand against her forehead and sighed heavily. “I know this is your life, honey, and your responsibility. I’ve recited that to myself more times than I can count. I’ve had to repress the urge to beat the living hell out of Rupert Giles a few times, but I know it’s nothing he wished upon you. But seeing those monsters outside—”
Buffy licked her lips and nodded. “I know.”
“I’m just glad you’re home.”
“Not for long.”
There was no way for her mother to mask her disappointment, and while she knew the guilt trip was unintentional, seeing the woman’s eyes fall hurt nonetheless. “Oh.”
“Yeah. I’m just here to get some stuff.”
Joyce nodded. “Yeah. I...I figured you’d be leaving again.”
“He’s taking care of me, Mom.”
Buffy froze. Where that had come from, she didn’t know. Only it seemed important to guarantee the woman of something—even if a generic reassurance did little more than send her back to the 1950s. Spike wasn’t taking care of her any more than she took care of him; they took care of each other, because that was the way it was. That was the way they worked.
However, it needed to be said, if only to get that look out of her mother’s eyes. Joyce expelled a deep breath and nodded again with a small smile. “He loves you very much,” she observed.
A small smile played across Buffy’s lips. “Yes, he does,” she agreed softly. “And...he’s gonna be worried about me if I don’t get home soon. We decided that I needed to talk to Giles by myself about what happened tonight.”
“And what happened tonight?”
“Angelus and Darla got away.” It amazed her how easily the words rolled off her tongue. The crux of her personal failure, and she was able to admit it without flinching—without even considering the words themselves, and what they meant for her. Somehow, that made everything easier. If she could say the words like that, deliberately like that, she could just as easily pick up the pieces and try again. Try as often as she needed to until Willow’s murderers were one with the earth. “They got away and I was worried that Giles was going to blame me.”
Joyce blinked. “Why in the world would he blame you?”
“I don’t know. I just thought he would.” She released a deep breath and glanced down. “Mom, can we do this some other time? I’m really tired. I just wanna get some stuff and go home. Talking about this right now actually made my Top Ten list on things I don’t want to do. It’s just been an incredibly long night.” A pause. “I hope you understand.”
A frown crossed the other woman’s face, but she hid it quickly and nodded. “Oh, of course.”
“I don’t mean to hurt your feelings, I just really wanna go home.”
“I totally understand that. Go on upstairs and get whatever you need.” Joyce smiled softly and patted her back in support. “And you should...go home.”
She paused at that. “I didn’t mean—”
“Buffy, if you’re already thinking of the house you have with Spike as home, then it is. You’re lucky. You lucked it out on the first try.”
“The Powers kinda made it easy for me.”
“But not for the other girls in your line of work, right? They’ve just made it easy for you.” Joyce looked at her a minute longer, then broke away, waving the wine glass as she turned toward the kitchen. “I’m going to go put this in the sink, then go to bed.”
Buffy nodded. “Okay.”
“But do your mother a favor. Wake me up in about twenty minutes with a phone call, okay?”
She rolled her eyes. “I’ll get home fine.”
Joyce shrugged. “Yeah, so call me to tell me ‘I told you so.’ Trust me, it’ll help me sleep.”
“Yeah, this would be a good time to mention that we don’t have a phone yet.”
The woman frowned. “Please, please get one. Soon. Tomorrow. Please. I can live with you not being here anymore, but under the provision that you’re a phone call away.”
The Slayer opened her mouth to object again—to berate her mother and tell her that she and Spike would acquire their belongings on their own time—but found herself nodding instead. If it eased Joyce’s nerves, there was absolutely no reason to deny her that peace. A phone call at the end of the night was the very least she could offer, especially with as well as her mom had taken all the recent revolutionary changes in her life.
It didn’t take too long to put her things together. She and Spike, the day before, had bought a bed, a mattress, and a dresser. The task of shopping itself had been difficult, as most stores closed before sunset in that tacit agreement the town held with the demon population. Furthermore, they received more than one weird look in suddenly popping up and disappearing without ever accessing the front doors. For as ‘in the know’ as most people in Sunnydale were, they had a strange way of treating those so easily identifiable as creatures of the night.
Perhaps seeing a vampire in the daylight was what unnerved them. As long as monsters stayed in the dark, it seemed, accepting the underworld was a task made easy.
The actual moving day was scheduled for the weekend. For now, she simply needed some clothes to get her to Friday.
It was strange, though. She hadn’t expected it to be so strange. She hadn’t expected to get emotional as she stuffed t-shirts and jeans into a duffle bag. As she took Mr. Gordo down from his place of reverence on her dresser. As she picked up Mr. Jenkins and smiled into his worn, familiar eyes that hadn’t aged as well as she had. She’d never wrangled a confession from him, but she suspected that Spike had relied on the teddy bear in their years apart more than he wanted her to know.
Her eyes fell on the window. On the tree that sat outside her bedroom. It hadn’t been long—God, it really hadn’t been all that long. How was it that so much had changed since that first night? Since she saw Spike looking after her following their disastrous reunion. She would never forget the look in his eyes when she’d whispered her invitation; when she’d abolished the barrier between them, even with as hurt as she’d been. Even with as terrified as she was at the power a virtual stranger held over her. There was the larger part of her, the part of her that had recognized him from the beginning, that beckoned her trust. That wanted him with her, regardless of what that meant. Regardless of everything, as she had been taught, that mattered.
Imagining him outside her window now, she was bothered with how much even the thought of separation hurt. How it pained her to think of a time when she didn’t have such a potent connection with him.
And then the pain was gone. Spike’s presence warmed her through their claim—a disembodied presence, a hint of warmth from a distance, but that much was enough to remind her that the time she was thinking of was now in the past. There would never again be a time when he wasn’t with her.
Buffy smiled and brushed a kiss against Mr. Jenkins’s worn fur.
She was going home.
*~*~*
There was no furniture in the living room, save the coffee table she and Spike had smuggled out of her mother’s basement. It was positioned awkwardly in the middle of the room, cartons of Chinese takeout resting on its surface alongside two candles that were burned down in a sea of melting wax.
A smile tugged at her lips. “Spike?” she called softly, lowering her duffle bag to the floor. “I’m home.”
Silence was her answer. She made her way over to the banquet her mate had prepared for her, not realizing how hungry she was until the scent of chicken and egg rolls hit her tenfold. Then she lost restraint, downing everything he’d set out for her in a matter of minutes, glad for the darkness and her solitude that masked her gluttony.
It had been a week and a half since she last tasted food. There was no other explanation. Buffy nodded to herself, wiping her mouth and rising to her feet, full but satisfied. She collected her trash and wandered through the dark into the kitchen. She placed the empty cartons into the paper sack they were using as a trash can, poured herself a glass of water, and reveled in the sensation of being in her own home. A home that was hers. A home where she could forgo all use of coasters if she liked, but wouldn’t because that would be disrespectful of her new home.
Buffy released a deep breath and tossed her paper cup into the makeshift trash.
Theirs. For now. If only for now.
How long do we have?
It didn’t matter, really. It truly didn’t. When it was time to leave, they would leave. If they didn’t live here, they would live somewhere else. There would always be a place for them, and anywhere she went with Spike, she would be home.
Buffy licked her lips and wandered down the hallway toward the bedroom they shared. She paused in the doorway and grinned, the sight that greeted her thoroughly warming her heart.
Spike was lying on his back, nude in repose, obviously awaiting her homecoming.
And he was fast asleep.
“Mmm,” she mused thoughtfully, her eyes trailing down his naked chest and frowning when her progression was halted by an offensive sheet that concealed his goodies from her reverent eyes. “I seem to have found my way into a Playgirl photo shoot.”
There was no response. He was really out.
Buffy sighed and quickly stripped. With as tired as she was, she was surprised at her own disappointment to encounter her lover sleeping. However, with everything they had nearly lost tonight, the need to reaffirm their connection was calling to her. She wanted his fangs in her throat, his cock in her body, and his arms around her while he murmured again that everything would be all right, if only for a little while.
But they’d been through a lot tonight, and she wasn’t going to deprive him of sleep because she needed reassurance that the sun was going to rise. She did, however, stop to run her fingers over the fading scar on his abdomen, her body tightening when she thought of what could have happened had the blade been thrown at any other angle. What could have happened had Angelus shot for her mate’s neck.
She shuddered and shook the thought away, leaning over to brush a kiss over his wounded flesh.
“Your aim’s a li’l off, pet.”
Buffy smiled and glanced up. “Hey, sleepyhead.”
“Hey yourself.” He grinned and shifted to sit up. “How long’ve you been home?”
“A few minutes.”
“I swear, I was only gonna rest my eyes for a second or so.”
She dropped a kiss against his chest. “It’s okay.”
“I wanted to be awake when you got home.”
“And that’s why you’re so naked?”
Spike smirked. “Yeh,” he agreed with a purr, running his tongue over his teeth with a familiar twinkle gracing his dancing eyes. “There was gonna be an option, see. Either you got to eat or eat.”
She shivered but smacked his shoulder playfully. “Pig.”
“You like pigs.”
“That’s totally beside the point.”
“Yeh.” He sat up, running his hands up her arms, encouraging her to sit beside him on the mattress as his wandering fingers skimmed the healing patch of skin on her abdomen. “Lemme see this again.”
She swatted at his hands. “You saw it plenty earlier.”
“Yeh, an’ now I wanna see it again.”
“You know I’m okay, right?”
“Yeah.”
“You know that the knife hit you, as in not me, and that if anyone has a right to be worried about anyone here, it’s me?”
Spike shrugged. “Well, I know you feel that way.”
“You know that I’m the Slayer.”
“Yes. Everythin’ you’re sayin’ right now covers information that I already have.”
“And yet you’re looking anyway.”
“Yeh. You shouldn’t’ve stripped.”
“Well, see, I was hoping that I might get to eat.”
“Minx.”
She wagged her finger at him, mimicking that brow waggle of his that drove her crazy. “Well, that’s what you get for implying that being naked around you is something deserving of punishment.”
Spike domed a brow. “Yeh, ‘cause that’s what I meant by that. An’ since when did checkin’ to make sure you’re okay translate into punishment?”
“I have my own language.”
“Hadn’t noticed.” He tugged her close and kissed her thoroughly, her mock-defenses melting at the sensuous feel of his lips against hers. The simplest touch had the power to make her lose herself. Her body burned with need for his, her arms linking around his neck as she shifted into his lap, murmuring against his lips. “There’s my language for you,” he whispered.
“I like your language.”
“Mhmm. I thought you might.” Spike palmed a breast, his fingers kneading her nipple as his mouth dipped to suckle at her other. “You’re tired,” he observed, licking at her flesh. “I can feel how tired you are.”
“I’m tired,” she agreed, pushing him back to the mattress, capturing him between her thighs. “But...it’s strange. I need to...there’s something I need.”
His eyes flashed. “I know, baby.”
“You feel it, too.”
“I feel it. Let me take care of you.”
She shook her head, lowering her mouth to his chest. “No, I don’t think so.”
“Buffy—”
“You got stabbed. I’ll be doing the care-taking, if it’s all the same to you.”
“Bugger that.”
“I intend to.”
He chuckled in spite of himself, then hissed a long gasp as her mouth began a decadent exploration down his body. She nipped at his skin, her tongue caressing the wound that stretched across his abdomen. “Remind me to tell you what that means one of these days,” he said.
She quirked a brow, one of her hands delving beneath the tinted sheets and curling effortlessly around his erection. “It’s one of those funny British words that sounds like it should mean something but actually means something else, isn’t it?”
“This comin’ from the only bird who butchers the English language every time she opens her mouth?”
“You know, considering what I have in my hand...” She squeezed his cock for good measure, enjoying the telling widening of his eyes as a moan spilled through his lips and he thrust against her touch. “You’re not exactly in the ideal position to be complaining about my mouth.”
Spike stiffened at that and shook his head. “Not complainin’, luv. Definitely not complainin’.”
She grinned, her thumb caressing his velvety head. “And my English?” she asked, ducking beneath the sheets and engulfing him with her tongue. “How’s my English?”
He gasped and ran his fingers through her hair. “Bloody brilliant.”
“Mhmm.”
“Fuck, pet.” He sat up again the next instant, whipping the sheet back as his eager gaze drank in the sight of her lips suckling greedily on his shaft. “Oh, that’s gorgeous, that is.”
She released him with a heavy plop, pumping him fiercely to compensate for the absence of her mouth as her tongue flicked his head. Her other hand dropped to his balls, cupping him intimately and squeezing in time with her strokes. “Do you remember the first time I did this?”
“Considerin’ it was a week an’ a half ago, yeh.”
She pouted. “Was not.”
“God, Buffy, please.” His hands batted hers away, his fingers curling around his erection. “Need you. Need your hot mouth.”
She smiled and pressed a kiss to his sensitive head. “Has it really been just over a week?” she asked seriously, a shiver running down her spine. That night in her room seemed so far away. So long ago. It hadn’t been, logically. She knew that. The millennia that depicted the life before completing the claim and after completing the claim had her days backwards. She knew that she remembered that night well. She remembered waking up to an empty bed. She remembered seeing Angelus in her doorway. She remembered Spike shouting that he loved her without thought. She remembered the fear and outrage bursting into euphoria, and her girlish desire to taste him. To explore his body as he so enjoyed exploring hers.
She’d been a child such a short time ago. How was it that she had suddenly grown up?
A lifetime of experience had crammed itself into a span of just a few days. Here she was, in a new house with a man whose love defied logic and reason. Whose devotion to her surpassed fairytale romance and Hollywood endings. Her mouth was around him, encircling him, drowning him, and she felt her own body worked to a peak of unbearable sexual frenzy at the games she played.
“Oh, Buffy,” he gasped, thrusting deeper into her mouth. “Feels so good. So fucking good. My hot li’l Slayer.”
She felt the head of his cock hit the back of her throat, and began swallowing around him the way she knew he loved.
“Oh God, I’m not gonna last.”
She murmured around him and drew her head back, running her teeth along a particularly sensitive vein. “It’s okay,” she said. “Just let it happen.”
“Buffy—”
His fingers clutched at her hair as she took his cock back inside her mouth, his hips flailing wildly off the mattress, the moans tearing from his lips making her burn. She didn’t know that she could feel like this tonight—tonight of all nights. That she could hit the floor of Hell and look up to paradise within a matter of hours. And when he spilled himself down her throat, she drank him with eagerness that betrayed her need.
Her lips slid over his shaft with sensuality she didn’t even know she possessed, until he fell out of her mouth again. Then she kissed his hip and rested her head against his belly, enjoying the cool, comforting arms that surrounded her. The feel of his explorative fingers roaming through her hair, his hands mapping out her body as far as he could reach.
“I love you,” she said softly.
“You’re amazing,” he murmured. “Come up here, baby.”
“Mmm...”
“Come here.”
Buffy pressed a kiss to his stomach and crawled up the length of his body, cupping his face tenderly. “I’m so glad I got to come home to this,” she said, a shudder racing through her body. “I don’t know if I could’ve...”
“Did the meeting with the Scoobies not go well?”
“No,” she replied, resting her head against his chest, “actually they were pretty cool about everything. Giles said I shouldn’t blame myself.”
“He knows that I said that firs’, right?”
“Yes, and he knowingly agreed with you.”
Spike snickered and ran his hand down her back lovingly. “Well, he must either really wanna make amends with you, or that’s jus’ the Powers’ way of tellin’ you that you need to listen to me more often.”
“I listen to you plenty.”
“I think you could stand to do it more.”
“Then I wouldn’t be me.”
She felt his smile without needing to glance up. “If you weren’ you, I’d be wherever you are.”
“This conversation is slipping into that territory where we’re no longer making sense.” She shifted. “I think it’s because you’re sleepy.”
“You’re sleepy.”
“That, too.”
“You know what you should do?”
“Sleep.”
“Yeh. Only I have a problem.”
Buffy snickered against him. “One?”
“I got off.”
“This is a problem?”
“Yes.”
“And here I thought I’d perfected my technique.”
Spike’s eyes narrowed and his wandering fingers tickled her side. “None of that.”
“Well, I’m just saying, if there’s a problem about that, it can only be—”
“I got off an’ you din’t.”
“I got off on you getting off.”
“Not the way I want you gettin’ off. I’m the one who’s s’psed to get you off.”
“Trust me when I say you do.” She raised her head to meet his eyes, brushing a kiss across his lips. “Tomorrow, sweetie. When I see the sun’s come up. I have everything I needed tonight.”
Spike released a deep sigh and tugged her close for another kiss. “The sun’s gonna come up, luv.”
“I know.”
“It will.”
“It tends to do that.” She rested her brow against his chest and sighed. “I’ll tell you one thing...whenever your family decides to enact a special plan designed to make my life a living hell, it makes for some long, emotionally draining nights.”
He tensed at that but didn’t reply, his arms around her tightening. A few minutes of taut silence stretched between them; he caressed her back in gentle strokes, breathing just slightly enough to let her know that he was thinking seriously about something. And in that second, she wished she had the ability to revert time and snatch the words from her mouth. No matter what was said, she knew he felt terrible enough as it was about everything he’d put her through. Everything that had happened to her and her friends was a byproduct of his reentry into her life.
That wasn’t the way she saw it, of course, but she knew that a very large part of Spike felt thoroughly responsible for all the bad that had happened. And there was nothing she could do about that; no amount of reassurance would sway his self-judgment. It was simply a matter of getting the bad behind them, even if it meant diving headfirst into territory marked worse.
“Thank you,” Spike murmured softly, jarring her back to herself.
“For what?”
“For loving me.”
She melted and glanced up, meeting his eyes. “Easiest thing I’ve ever done.”
“Doesn’ seem like it.”
“Well, I was conflicted there for a while, but after I admitted it had already happened...easiest thing I’ve ever done.”
It was. There was no simpler joy than loving Spike. And as long as she had him, had this, she would not want for anything.
He smiled and kissed her again. “Yeh,” he said. “I know what you mean.”
And he did, of course. Far better than she ever would.
At the end of the day, though, there was this. Buffy snuggled against his chest again, her eyes fluttering shut. Yes, there was this. No matter what, the rest of her evenings would see a night spent in his arms. The sun would rise and set with them side by side. No matter what else changed, that would stay the same. Always.
She felt his lips caressing her brow.
“I love you,” he whispered. “I love you so much.”
Her body warmed.
There was this.
And thankfully, this was everything.
*~*~*
The air smelled of sunrise.
A smile tugged at the corners of Spike’s mouth as his eyes fluttered open. Slivers of sunshine cracked the walls and the floor, fighting the curtains that he’d diligently pulled shut the night before. In all honesty, he had no idea how long they’d slept. Such was the downside of endless nights; the hours turned to years. It had felt later than it was when he’d arrived home, and the scent of daybreak had still been several hours off when he and Buffy finally fell asleep.
It amused him that he was waking up at sunrise rather than turning in. Such was simply another testament to how radically his life had changed in the past fourteen years.
Hell, in the past fourteen days.
There was still so much left to do. Left to accomplish. Yet he couldn’t help but share the sense of finale that Buffy had expressed to him the night before. For the first time since the claiming ritual, he felt it was safe to take a proverbial breath. To rest in the face of incredible odds and thank whatever had helped them this far. That he had passed the hurdles set in his path by the Powers and their drastically unfunny sense of humor.
There were times, even now, when Buffy’s eyes still flashed gold for him. It was always understated; subtle, but there was a reminder of everything now mapped in the past. Every obstacle he’d overcome simply to be where he was now. To enjoy the warmth of her embrace, gaze upon her body curled so lovingly into his, and feel the breaths that pressed her chest. Revel in the heartbeat that cadenced rhythmically against his skin. He looked at her and marveled.
Fourteen years ago, he couldn’t have envisioned being here. Holding her as he did now, smelling sunrise pour in through cracks in the home they owned together. Fourteen years ago, she’d been a child. A small girl with tear-streaked cheeks and a cheery disposition in the face of odds more incredible than his self-worth. She’d adored him from the get-go. She’d clung to him, sobbingly begging him to stay with her. Feeling things, he was sure, that no four-year-old had ever felt, or was ever supposed to feel. Feeling things that no slayer before her had ever dreamt of; she was the first in the line to make it this far.
Fourteen years ago, the prospect of waiting for her had nearly killed him. And now, here he was. Lying in bed with the woman he loved more than he’d ever thought he was capable of loving. The life he’d once had—watching Angelus and Darla fuck with their food, torture, rape, and pillage; all in the namesake of the claim they so enjoyed rubbing in his face—greeted him now with disgust.
But that had been the way of things before. Before Buffy. Before the embodiment of bliss that he held in his arms. Before his awakening, the model of a vampiric claim was based on what he saw in Angelus and Darla. The two most loathsome creatures in the world. There was no tact, affection, or anything beyond a devotion to the same blood-drenched lifestyle. There was no love between them, and they were mates. They had the outward appearance of love, but it wasn’t there.
They didn’t deserve what they’d been given. They never had.
He remembered Angelus and Darla’s mocking ridicule, the superiority they boasted over him because they’d found each other by flipping a coin in a game of chance. And he’d let them. He’d let them drive him to tears for want of what he couldn’t have. What he wasn’t worthy to touch. What he didn’t deserve.
And then this small child had been offered to him, and his life had changed. In a second, his life had changed. His entire existence was called into question. The inability to grasp that he actually belonged to someone. That his life truly had value. And yes, while it had taken him a while to understand the complexities of his claim, belonging to anyone had been enough to inspire him with hope.
Belonging to Buffy was the greatest privilege he’d ever known, or would ever know. He loved her so much. And with as much as he’d sacrificed, it was nothing compared to the world she had given up to be with him.
Spike shivered and ran his hand down her back, smiling at her sleeping face. She hadn’t moved much in the course of the night; only shifted so that her head rested against his shoulder rather than his chest. Her left arm was strewn across his body, her leg draped just slightly over his. He felt her wet heat pressed intimately against his thigh. She was so lovely. A fallen angel that the Powers had somehow selected for him. His girl.
God, he loved her.
And he needed to show her how much. Right now. After last night, there was nothing he needed quite so much as her flesh beneath his, her silken walls around him, her lips on his skin. The demon demanded reassurance that his mate was still with him, unwilling to believe what his eyes already knew. He remembered telling her a few days before that sex was the easiest way to reach that plane of truly intimate connection with a claim so young. He’d felt the need burning through him all through the night. Felt it as he’d rested on the bed in wait for her homecoming, even as fatigue had won him over.
The long and winding road...
He felt it now, despite the fact that she was resting beside him. His eyes could see her, his body could feel her, but there was something beyond the physical that needed her now.
Spike rolled her gently onto her back and brushed a kiss across her brow. “So gorgeous,” he murmured reverently, his wandering mouth directing him southward. His tongue circled one dusty nipple, savoring her rich taste as his eager fingers slid further down her body, parting her thighs and cupping her center.
Such warmth. He was the only one who would ever know this bliss.
That leads...to your door...
He slid two fingers inside her hot cavern, his thumb sliding over her clit. “Wake up, sweetling,” he said softly, brushing a parting kiss against her nipple as his mouth continued southbound. “Daddy wants to play.”
Will never disappear. I’ve seen that road before.
“Mmm...” Buffy stirred in her sleep but did not awaken. He rubbed her swelling pearl with tender veneration, his greedy tongue nibbling at her sodden folds, licking up her body’s juices with enthusiasm. “Guh.”
“Wake up, baby.”
It always leads me here. Lead me to your door.
Buffy’s eyes flew open as a gasp tore through her throat. “Ohhh, my God.”
“There she is,” he purred, deftly removing his fingers from her core. He slid his arms under her hips to anchor her into his mouth, rubbing his face in her pussy. “There’s my beautiful girl.”
“Spike ”
“Good mornin’.”
“Mmmm...” She smiled kittenishly and threaded her fingers through his hair. “Good morning.”
“Woke up hungry,” he explained, lapping up her slit, his hand sliding over her leg to capture her clit between his thumb and index finger, rubbing her tenderly as his eyes drank her in. “You don’ mind, do you?”
Buffy gasped and thrust herself into his mouth. “Ohh....”
He chuckled. “I’ll take that as a ‘no.’”
“Oh my God.”
“Mmm...like baked apples.” His eyes twinkled as he took in the luscious sight of her, tingling with yearning and taut with anticipation. “You taste so good, sweetheart. I’ll never tire of your taste.”
“Spike ”
“How does this feel?” He spread her pussy lips wide with two fingers, sucking at her wet flesh before delving his tongue into her tight hole. “Tell me.”
“Oh God.” She threw her head back and sobbed softly as he began a slow, torturous massage of her clit once more, his talented tongue thrusting in and out of her body. “So good. You...oh God Spike, oh my God ”
“You like that, baby?”
She nodded furiously. “Uh huh.”
“Like the feel of my tongue fuckin’ your delectable li’l quim?”
“Oh...” She tugged at him mercilessly. “Spike, get up here!”
“I like it where I am, thank you.”
“I want you inside me ”
“I am inside you.” To emphasize his point, he licked deeper within her pussy. “A man could get drunk on you.”
“Oh God. Oh my God ”
“That’s it...” Slowly, he eased his tongue out of her body, holding her still as she quivered. “There’s my good girl.”
“God, you’re trying to kill me.”
“Well, you know what they say about the French.”
She quirked a brow. “And ‘the little death’?”
“Bloody French.” He blew a stream of air across her trembling skin, grinning roguishly at her as she quivered under his masterful touch. Then his lips found her clit, pulling the tender distended flesh hard into his mouth with a low moan of approval. He slid a finger inside her, then another. “No one could ever call this dyin’. Dyin’ I know. This...” His tongue favored her clit with another hard suck, enjoying the whimper that touched the air. “Don’ think I lived until I tasted this.”
Buffy thrashed and wailed, her grasp on him becoming demanding. “Spike, get up here ”
He arched a brow and nipped at her. “Make me.”
She scowled and scissored her legs around him. “Don’t think I won’t.”
“Oooh, feisty!”
“Has anyone ever told you that you’re a pain in the ass?” She paused and frowned at the self-satisfied smirk that crossed his lips. “Never mind. I don’t wanna know.”
“You could always find out yourself, luv.” He waggled his brows, his restless fingers tickling her sides. “That’d be somethin’ we haven’ tried yet.”
“Don’t even think about it, buster.”
“Too late. Thinkin’ about it.” He dropped a kiss across her stomach, prowling slowly up her body. “Mmm...think I jus’ went to my happy place.”
“Well you’re not getting into mine.”
He pouted.
“No.”
“Don’t knock it till you try it, pet.”
“Yeah, I see that philosophy really working out for you.”
“You don’ know that you wouldn’t like it.”
“Yes I do. Women only pretend to like it.”
“Bollocks.”
“Seriously.” She made a face that he couldn’t help but find adorable. “I read it in a magazine.”
Spike arched a brow, nibbling at one of her breasts. “I’d make it good for you,” he said softly. “No more painful that the other was, the way I’d do it. I’d make it so good. So good. You’d be begging me for it.”
He felt her resolve wavering. “Nuh uh.”
“Mhmm...we’ll see.”
“You’re so full of yourself.”
He smiled, taking his cock in his hand as he stopped above her, face to face. “Won’ ever make you do anythin’ you don’ want, pet,” he said, the tease abandoning his face as he rubbed his shaft against her sopping folds. “You give me so bloody much.”
Buffy grinned and linked her arms around his neck, drawing him down for a kiss and moaning into his mouth as his erection sank inside her. And that was that—the tension plaguing his conscious, the uncertainty that had followed them throughout the night melted entirely. He was one with her again. He was inside his mate, and the demon calmed. Hell, the demon positively purred with contentment, clutching onto the essence of his Slayer; the warmth that she drowned him in, the sweetest homecoming one could ever hope to obtain.
Buffy whimpered and flexed beneath him, hooking her arms under his shoulders. “I needed this,” she gasped, peppering small, sweet kisses against his skin. “I needed this so much.”
“I know, sweetling.”
He knew his quivering voice betrayed his mutual need for joining, but he took no shame at being weak for wanting her. He again recalled his earlier explanation of the claim’s need for constant unity, especially after periods of separation or turmoil. It baffled him that the sensation burning his insides could be simplified thus; could be deciphered in a few words when he felt every agonizing second apart from her as deeply as the hungry starved for food, or the parched thirsted for water.
He was within her now, moving slowly inside her body, reasserting their connection. He felt his being quiver with delight, the demon’s roars quieting to a slow, humble purr.
A world’s journey had led him here, and he still had miles to go.
Miles to go before he slept.
The prospect didn’t frighten him, though. Didn’t agonize him with the knowledge of what lay ahead. The understanding of what he had to do was burned in him, intrinsic in all things. He had Buffy, and with as much as he had sacrificed to get to where he was, she was worth a thousand times the burden. He would make the journey as often as it was demanded of him if only to know such bliss. He loved her so dearly, and he would make things right by her.
He would make everything right. If it took the rest of eternity, he would make everything right.
He tasted her tears when she came, clutching him to her in case the world decided to rip him away.
“Taste me,” she whispered, offering her throat.
Spike moaned and buried his face in her heavenly skin. “I love you. My gorgeous mate. Buffy...God, Buffy, I love you so much.”
She clutched him tighter. “I love you.”
Her words embraced his heart, and he knew then if he’d never known before. Whatever lay ahead was more than worth it. Whatever they had to face would be a fate shared. Nothing mattered if she wasn’t with him, but she was the one constant that had been at his side. Before knowing her, it had been the promise of her. And when he’d first seen her, it had been the assurance of some day.
Now there was eternity. Lifetimes to be lived in her arms. He felt the strength of her love encompass him wholly, and took her blood with humble knowledge of how precious her gift was.
He withdrew his fangs from her throat and licked the wound clean, then sweetly pressed his brow to hers. “Mine,” he murmured softly.
Buffy smiled into his eyes. “Always.”
Always.
It didn’t matter, then. They would chase down the shadows that haunted them, but they had all the truth they needed in each other. There were still promises to keep, and he would see them kept. They would together. Hand-in-hand.
Even with miles to go before they slept.
fin
Challenge Guidelines
Name: Kar
Email: karbear57@yahoo.com
Seasons: AU/AR
Challenge: 106
Drusilla takes Buffy when she's a child (say ~4 y.o.) and brings her to Spike who is upset at something Dru did (you pick)!!! Spike decides to piss Dru off by letting Buffy-the-kid go and actually takes her back to her home. She weeds her way into William's (not the demon) heart by hugging him or something utterly cute like that. Years later- Buffy is called to be a Slayer. Will Spike remember the 4y.o. sparkling green eyes as she fights him for her life?
Must haves:
1. No Angel/us stalking Buffy
2. Spike and Drusilla on the outs
3. Spike biting (claiming or turning) Buffy in a sensual way
Can haves:
1. Set before Sunnydale
2. Pg13-Nc17
3. Spike checking up on Buffy as she grows up
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