Rating: R
Timeline: Post Season 6 with no reference to Season 7
Summary: Spike, struggling with his soul and his love for Buffy, is offered redemption from a very surprising source. However, when signs of an uprising evil begin to appear, he must face his fear and guilt and return to the place it all began for him—Sunnydale.

Disclaimer: The characters herein are the property of Joss Whedon. They are being used for entertainment purposes and not for the sake of profit. No copyright infringement is intended.

[Prologue] [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12] [13] [14] [15] [16] [17] [18] [19] [20] [21] [22] [23] [24] [25]

[26] [27] [28] [29] [30] [31] [32] [33] [34] [35] [36] [37] [38] [39] [40] [41] [42] [43] [44] [45] [Epilogue]

*~*~*

Chapter Eleven 

She kicked him to the wall—fiercely, bluntly. Her insides were screaming with wretched betrayal, her inner will struggling at the reflection of self-recognition cradling his horrified features. Instant remorse. Recognition. The worst sort of recognition. No, no…she couldn’t look at his face. Her body was trembling now, trembling with hurt, hand clutching her robe to her chest. She knew her eyes were cold—dead, as cold she as had felt since returning.

She opened her mouth to speak, to send those harsh words into the void. To satisfy any lingering thought that redemption lived in this house. However, her voice never came. Dry hisses scratched at her throat, but looking at those eyes, she couldn’t find it within herself to speak. The situation presented itself beyond words. She was simply hurt. Hurt that he would ever take it this far. Hurt that after all that had passed, he had it in him to do something so…

Words fueled her once again, face flushing angrily with reason. But she never got the chance to speak. Spike was torn from the wall in a whirl of sudden force, face pounded into the bathroom tile without ceremony. Again and again, he was thrashed about. The attacker was shrouded in shadows, but she thought she could see…she thought she could see…

It was him. Spike. Spike attacking himself. Spike, growling with such outraged possession it sent small ripples of cold across her skin. Spike coming to rescue her from himself. She watched dumbly as he hit himself—his victim sitting there in the stillness of remorse, accepting each blow, eyes dull with self-loathing and regret.

She had the vague conception that even as he sent himself down this path of self-abuse, her words would still hurt him more than he ever could. And yet, her lips remained sealed and she watched.

With every punch Spike gave the personification of himself, he screamed with fury, “I won’t let you hurt her, you bloody ponce! I won’t let you hurt her again! You’re nothing! Evil! You monster! You disgusting evil wanker! Die and leave her alone!”


The scene began to change. When she blinked, she found herself standing in the mansion. The old mansion. A mirrored fight ensued in the middle of the room, before Acathla could awake. Angel was nowhere in sight. No, she was wielding the sword, all right, but a different vampire was staged at the opposing end. The fight was a mimic of actuality. For so long, her dreams had ventured here—for other reasons, of course, but she couldn’t ignore the sense of déjà vu. If someone had told her this had happened differently, she would not believe it. All she knew was a very evil and guiltless vampire was her nemesis, and she had to kill him. Kill him before he killed her.

Or worse.

At last, she got the better of him. Spike was strong, of course, and her triumph was likely more accredited to chance than talent. With sinking defeat, he fell to his knees. Buffy drew the sword back, inwardly insisting that she was justified and that things would return to normal if she could just finish it. Finish it now.

A last act of love. Shoulders relaxing in acceptance of defeat, Spike looked up to her, eyes filled with warmth, love, and regret. So much regret. She heaved a sigh as her vision clouded with tears.

“Make me what I was.” The words left him with assurance and faith, believing she had all the power in the world.

Forgiveness? Was that what he sought? Buffy excreted a breath and lowered her sword. A moment’s hesitation before she helped him to his feet. And there they stood, looking at each other with anger and remorse, love and confusion, hatred and penance. If life was a roller coaster, she had permanent seating at the very front. The embodiment of everything she hated and everything she was, standing there…waiting for her to kill him. Waiting, just waiting…

Then she couldn’t stand it anymore. With violent insistence, Buffy leapt at him, hungry mouth demanding his. Initially soft, their kiss grew with intensity as she bounded across remaining borders. A flash and walls came crashing down. She tasted him thoroughly—wholly. Lips, tongue, and teeth. He was flavored like a fine wine, coursing through her, milking those parts that had been left to sort out the world of never-ending confusion. She demanded more than he could give—not that he didn’t try. His fervor was never put to the challenge. Nothing could ever be enough.

New words charged her voice. She wanted to say, ‘I love you’ but it wasn’t needed. Somehow, inevitably, he always understood. And she would never be ready for that. She could think it, sure, but she would never be ready.

It hurt.

How long they remained like that, she didn’t know. It couldn’t have been very long. In the thralls of their kiss, Spike’s head suddenly drew back and his eyes flashed, a tattered screaming escaping his lips. With blunt force, he tore from her arms, falling to Acathla’s feet as tremors overtook him. It only lasted a minute—then he was back. Blinking. Steady. Looking at her.

“Buffy?”

Those eyes. Those eyes! What—

There was no time to consider. Spike was gone the next instant, a pile of dust collecting at her feet. Buffy could summon no reaction at first. She looked down, mouth forming a line of indifference, eyes as wide as saucers. Nothing, then a horrendous uprising seized her lungs. Climbing up her legs, her insides, tearing, rasping until release at the mouth. The scream was loud and grasped a life of its own. Desperately, she collapsed to her knees; hands clawing at what was left of him, as though her authority alone could piece him back together.

A shadow fell over her and silenced her tears. It wasn’t reaction or reflex—rather a tight grasp on her throat, preventing any further release of ineffectual grief. How could she cry for someone she had told with such ardor that she didn’t love? That she hated? Demon. Demon. Demon. Evil. Remorseless. Mocking.

The tears kept coming. She couldn’t stop them. When Buffy finally looked up, she found herself in the presence of the Master. The Master…not quite as she remembered him, but there was no denying his distinctiveness. That smile. That look of pure glee. With a swift motion of his hand, he lured her to her feet—power blazing and influential. She was overwhelmed with a tug of familiarity. Dracula had done this to her years ago. Waved her over, possessed her with his eyes, his sensuality. The Master was not nearly as nice to look at, and yet his power over her was a mocking reflection of what transgression had taken place.

He kicked at the dust beneath his feet, grasping her arm with fierce possessiveness. Her hair was drawn from her neck, his chuckle rumbling against her back. “Vae, puto deus fio,” his dead voice sneered. Then his fangs were bared and sinking into her. Sucking her. Draining her.

Then there was Spike. Standing before her, bare-chested, eyes panicked and arms outstretched. Buffy’s eyes widened as she shuffled, feeling still bits of dust collect around her feet. He was different. So different. Bruises aligned his arms and shoulders from his fight—that fight with himself.

“Make me what I was,” he said. Then he was gone. And she fell to the ground, cold, dead, and swirling into a whirlpool of blackness.

The clock was flashing a persistent 3:56AM when she found the courage to open her eyes.

Of course, the room was vacant. She had long ago deciphered the shadows on the wall from devilish fiends of malicious intent, but Slayer dreams always shook her stability. They had been getting worse over the past few weeks, and though she couldn’t say that night’s was the most awful, it definitely ranked up there in the top five.

With intent stillness, Buffy sat up, clutching herself tightly. The room was the same as always, and yet it felt different. Tainted. She knew Willow had brought Spike up here during their heart-to-heart that evening, and even as he was hours away, she could still feel him near. Perhaps it was the after-wear of seeing his visibly shaken demeanor at Giles’s. It was aggravating—this feeling without him being near.

It was her third awakening and this time, she swore she would not look out the window. He wasn’t there. He hadn’t been there when she checked before, and he wouldn’t be there now.

But she felt him. It wasn’t enough that her sensory went into overdrive when she was patrolling, but her modified Spike-tingly had been kicking her in the gut all evening, even without him lurking within convenient proximity. He was in town, and that was enough for her senses.

Coldness flushed over her with sudden insistence, shoving her sensory aside. Buffy shivered and instinctively reached for the duster she kept near her bed, flinging it over her shoulders and coddling within its protective embrace. They had not spoken directly that evening, but Spike gave his share of forthright insight, and as much as she hated to admit it, he was right. There were other evils in the mix now, and worrying about him was the least of her troubles.

A Master was rising.

With as often as she repeated that to herself, it didn’t seem right. The affect did little more than expand the sense of deadness growing inward. A Master was rising. A Master stronger than the one that had killed her. A Master that would stop at nothing until she was dead. Or suffering. Or both.

The first nemesis she confronted was the Master. The first true challenge. So much had happened since then. Every year had presented its face of indestructible evil, and every year seemed to get progressively worse. Save the last three, when the challenge was minimal due to this uprising manifestation. And yet, with all she had faced, with every foe that crossed her path, despite the increasing amount of difficulty to survive, the Master held the epitome of her fears. Her first. Her first defeat. Her first apocalypse. Her first death. And now, one more menacing than the one before him would come to take his place, and though Giles was hesitant to say, she was certain the text indicated the death of the slayer. It always did.

Did this mean a repeat of the beginning? Would there be another Anointed One? Another Harvest? Or would that be for the next slayer to handle?

She wondered if she had lived so long because she had killed the Master. And now for what? Was it all in vain?

“I don’t want to die,” she whispered to the darkness. Such an admission. Die once and you get a second chance. Die twice and your friends drag you kicking and screaming out of Heaven. Die three times…was there a place in the world for a girl with as many lives as she? The sensation itself was overwhelming. She didn’t know if she could do it again.

Buffy did not fear death, but she certainly did not crave it. It was difficult, reflecting this threat with such indifference. Cold was the night, and she did not know what to feel.

Except that Spike was in town, and she had promised herself she would see him today. Somehow, knowing that overshadowed everything of significance with its looming tangibility. Three years and she would see him. It didn’t feel that long. It felt like an eternity—it felt like seconds. It felt she had died a thousand times. It felt it had been yesterday. Emotions welled and confused. How would she act around him?

She almost wished he had never left. In retrospect, it was probably for the best. Her feelings had been so one-sided after she had time to analyze herself, and acknowledging her partial fault hadn’t been the highlight of the year. Had Spike still been there, lingering about, she likely would have staked him out of spite. But he hadn’t been there. If he only he had. At least then she would know what to say to him. All sense of prose vacated her body without rite. The gap between them was broad and awkward. Even working together, as Giles—despite his words—so obviously intended, might not quench the discomfiture blazing in the place resentment had once occupied. A long-term silence, fixed with hard-to-answer questions and harder-to-hear answers. With as much as she had prodded Giles the night before, he never came close to revealing why he had placed such implicit faith in Spike’s goodwill. Nothing beyond what she had overheard. That he was there as a favor, and it was to protect her.

Protect her from the Master.

What honestly could Spike do that she couldn’t? After all, she was the Slayer. Who said she needed protecting? Buffy growled lightly to herself, flipping onto her stomach without removing the duster and drawing a pillow close to her chest. The clock now read 3:58. Her body was tired but she could not will her mind to rest.

Not with the looming promise of further nightmares.

Not with another Master rising.

Not with Spike in town.

Not with these inner churnings that wouldn’t leave her alone.

Sleep had no place in this house.

That evening at the Magic Box was even more confined than the previous night. It wasn’t an arranged meeting; everyone sort of flocked there instinctually when something big was poking over the horizon. The air gave way to new tensions. No one had said much, save Willow and the Watcher, who spoke in private while cautiously tossing her weary glances. Xander stood behind the register as he had the night before, obviously irritated. Her sister was next to him, keening, as though emphasizing her compliance with the opinion he had so actively voiced when the peroxide vampire was implicated. Willow, finished with her chat with Giles, shot her a suspiciously knowing glance before turning her attention to Angel. Angel. She had not spoken with him since their spat at the Bronze. He also was conspicuously silent, catching her eye every now and then, though not saying a word.

Not twenty-four hours had passed and she could detect a significant weight marking the air. For a minute, Buffy wished Anya still partook in these wearisome get-togethers. At least she knew how to keep the conversation rolling.

The air of secrecy had intensified. Without a word being said, she felt like she was the lone participant standing on the edge of a great discovery, and everyone else was invited to partake. A definite mood swing had overpowered Angel, to be sure. When he entered the Magic Box, she had expected him to immediately leap into the righteousness of his logic. However, he looked at her with solemn indifference, as though suddenly he had reason to be as confused as she was. Then, with apathy, he shook his head and retreated to the back of the store, speaking only once in response to Willow’s greeting.

A ten-minute interval passed before Giles broke the silence.

“I have discussed things with Buffy,” he announced, speaking only to her though his words were directed to everyone else. “My…arrival was hasty in a discovery I made with…” He paused, as though willing himself to remember, “Spike a few days ago.” Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Xander’s gaze brighten with fiery intensity, though she knew he would not act on his rage. With as much as he hated Spike, he kept his word to her with a thousand times the impact.

The look in the Watcher’s eyes flashed as he sensed the tension searing at the reminder of his unlikely companion, and it initiated an added emphasis on his irritated nerves. “With his help…no, that’s not right…Spike contacted the Council and convinced them to send me the volumes of books I mentioned yesterday. Through our research, we discovered that…” He sighed and removed his glasses. “A new Master will be arising very soon. One more powerful than the last. It has only happened once before…the Master that Buffy killed almost ten years ago was the second of his order. He was summoned a decade after the one preceding him was slain. And so it is prophesized to continue. A Master is killed, and ten years later, another will arise, and kill the Slayer responsible, should she still be living. And he will live until killed by another Slayer…and the cycle begins again.” The room was so still; one would assume it was filled with the unliving. Buffy had heard this the night before, of course, but it made her shiver just the same. “The books decreed it would only happen three times. I don’t know if that means the Order of the Masters will be destroyed with the coming of the next Slayer to defeat him, or if the…” The words world would end were tangible, but they had faced too many apocalypses to need the threat voiced by now. “All I know is, soon, very soon, this Master will arise. And Buffy will be his target.”

A long beat of reflective silence settled over the room. Heavy, thick, and pendulous. Buffy’s eyes were fixed on her clasped hands. There was nothing she could say—nothing to drive the coldness away.

Finally, Xander cleared his throat. “So, all of this just slipped your mind last night?”

“I wanted to tell Buffy alone before I told any of you.” Giles glanced to her, then to Angel, who had been there the first time when she was informed she would die at the Master’s hand. “But everyone was more concerned with my travel companion and his intentions. That…and I was hesitant. I admit it. I saw how it affected Buffy the first time, and even with everything we have faced…” A lengthy pause. “I spoke with Spike at length last night, and he made me see beyond my selfish withdrawal.”

“Yeah, speak of the devil, if he’s so good now, why isn’t he here?” Xander maneuvered from behind the register and prowled toward the Watcher. “Especially if he has his big friends to protect him? Doesn’t seem too noble to me. Coward is more the word that springs to mind.”

“Xander,” Willow berated softly, eliciting a sharp glance from Angel. Suddenly, they seemed to parallel the same understanding. “Hush. That won’t do any good.”

“Well, neither will he unless he gets his priorities straight.” Angrily, he wheeled back to Giles. “You said he was here to help. All right. I can deal with that. Sounds like we’ll need it. But I don’t see him helping. Is he here? No. All he’s doing is starting fights. We’re better off without the distraction.”

“No,” Willow retorted firmly. “You’re starting fights. Spike’s not doing anything. He’s not here. What has he done to you since he’s been back? Nothing. Or anything to Buffy, for that matter. He doesn’t want to be here anymore than you want him here. Why would he come around, anyway? With the welcoming you’re itching to give him, I’d stay away, too.”

The accumulation of conflicted surprise clouding Xander’s eyes was moving. He regarded his best friend as though he had never seen her before. “When did you suddenly start taking his side?”

Buffy heaved a sigh and kept her gaze trained on her hands.

“When I saw him last night.” Willow looked sharply to the Watcher, who mirrored her admission with no surprise. Rather, there was appreciative gratitude behind his eyes. He was no longer treading enemy terrain. “Giles was right. He’s changed, and he’s here to help us. And if any one of you know-it-alls decides to go test your testosterone and do what you think is heroic, I’ll…I’ll…well, I don’t know, but it won’t be nice.” There was a quiver at the end of her tone. The threat made so unconsciously several years before wouldn’t have meant anything, but now everything was different. Everyone walked on eggshells around Rosenberg.

Despite motivation, it seemed to do the trick. Xander’s face softened and he stepped back, hands coming up in a sign of neutrality. “Right, Will,” he whispered. “I already told Buffy I wouldn’t…do anything.”

The Slayer’s head shot upward, catching Willow’s eye. Tears were threatening to spill down her cheeks, and she sniffed and turned away. Her heart tore in two. Though she had never said it, Buffy knew her friend had needed something more than the sanctuary they had offered when she returned from London. She needed someone who had been there with her, holding her hand. Understanding. There wasn’t a doubt in her mind that the conversation she had with Spike dealt with that comprehension. Beforehand, Willow’s reaction to the vampire weighed heavily on the look Buffy portrayed. That had all ended the night before, and it was painfully clear why.

“I still don’t see why everyone is suddenly warming up to him,” Xander said honestly, aggravation in his tone, but controlled. “I mean…what happened? This time yesterday, Buffy was crying her heart out and Willow…you didn’t seem to…and Giles! You never explained…Dawn, help me!”

“It doesn’t seem so hard to understand to me,” her sister retorted. Confliction warred her tone but didn’t man her words. Loyalty was the overpowering emotion. “Spike’s a killer and a rapist and he doesn’t deserve to live.”

Willow’s eyes flared painfully, but she didn’t say anything.

Something stirred in the back. Angel. Buffy closed her eyes and swallowed a groan. With everything that was developing, the last she needed was another endless debate on the thorough badness of demons.

However, his words surprised her with frankness and consideration. He didn’t seem anymore convinced, just contemplative and confused. Perhaps hurt. Hurt because of her? No, not anymore. She knew that voice well. His tenor suggested self-disgust and aberration. “You heard Willow,” he said softly, commanding everyone’s attention with stunning detachment. A complete one eighty from his vocalized opinion the previous day. Buffy had to blink, her gaze finally broken from her hands as she wheeled slowly in her chair and stared at him. He didn’t respond to the stunned reaction he was receiving. “And you’ve heard Giles. The way I see it, we have plenty more to worry about than Spike’s return to town. He’ll come around when he knows he’s welcome. Having him here now, discussing these things, would just be distracting—especially with the hostility.”

That was it. Something had happened. Something big. Willow’s altered opinion and sudden bestowment of unabridged benevolence was confusing but acceptable. After all, she had felt evil before and was still in the process of healing. But Angel. Angel! With everything he had scolded her about at the Bronze, the patronizing sneer of a man who had been there, who claimed nothing—not even love—could alter the demeanor of a remorseless demon, such a change of esteem could not be obtained unless…

Buffy jumped to her feet and pivoted violently to face him. “Did you see Spike last night?” she demanded.

Angel returned her gaze sharply before casting his eyes downward. “I did,” he admitted. “He was coming by your house to tell you something, and I…we—”

There was a sharp gasp from behind. Buffy wheeled again, too fast for Willow to smother her recognition. The same response from Giles. A secret shared by three.

Dawn and Xander alone looked confused, their manifest judgment not wavering.

And no one was talking.

“All right!” she finally exploded. “I’m getting tired of this. Someone better tell me what the hell is going on, now! Giles shows up and admits he and Spike have been best friends since he went back to London. Willow runs into him last night and now they’re buddies. Angel…Angel, you fed me so much bullshit about things you couldn’t possibly understand, and now you…what’s going on?!”

“Ask him!” Willow returned sharply. “What, that’s what you said you were going to do! Find him, Buffy. Find him and ask him. It should be obvious. It was to all of us!”

“What was obvious?” It was true first tremor she had heard in Dawn’s voice.

“That’s for your sister to find out,” she replied, eyes not leaving the Slayer’s. “Go on, then. Find him. Talk to him. Ask him. You owe him that much.”

“Wait a sec.” Xander stormed forward. “She doesn’t owe him—”

A sense of passiveness overwhelmed her, and Buffy heaved a sigh. With accented impartiality, she stepped forward and placed a calming hand on her friend’s shoulder, smoldering his anger. “She’s right, Xan. I do need to talk to him.” She tightened the duster around her, watching Angel’s eyes blaze in momentary acknowledgment. “And I’m going right now.”

Chapter Twelve

She was certain her feet were made of sandstone with every step she took. Night blazed and enveloped with protective sheathing, but it wasn’t enough. Weighty breaths emanated from her heaving chest, each trembling with a lack of conviction. The continuous dance of one step forward, two steps back was beginning to ebb at her patience and challenge her resolve, but she couldn’t take the silence any longer. A day had passed since Dawn announced that Spike was back in town, but it felt like an eternity. So much had happened.

And yet she still did not hold any of her desired answers.

Meaningless words sprang to mind, discarded after momentary analysis. She was going to see him. She knew it. There was no going back. That much alone was hard enough to accept. But then there would be words. Looks. Confessions and likely a tearful apology. From who? Who was more deserving? Who had to apologize to whom?

Buffy fought to hold onto the hurt that had followed her that first year, but there was nothing left to grasp. What had he done that she hadn’t initiated? His existence alone had been fault enough at her feet. Existence, followed by that absurd humanity. Demons weren’t supposed to exhibit compassion, especially no more than humans did. But he had. He had defied everything she knew about vampires, and she resented him for it.

Never more than she resented herself.

However, that was beside the material point. After all, Spike was evil and soulless. Under all those good intentions, the will to be hers and to do the right thing, a killer resided. Trapped. Prodded. And with the right amount of influence, he would break through the barrier that had persuaded him to change by trapping his true nature. Chip be damned. It was technology, and technology failed them time and again. Sooner or later, the chip would fail them, too. And then where would they be?

She hated him for loving her without repression. Hated him for being good. Hated him for changing her world. Hated him for making her what she was. Hated her for making her feel. If she could feel that way about a monster, what did it make her? A blinding prejudice separated myth from actuality. Spike had been one of them once, sure, but even then he was different. Her match. Her equal.

He came to her even before the chip. They had killed Angelus together. They had saved the world. All these things he was supposed to be incapable of. Love. Faith. Trust. Tenderness. Comfort.

There was danger there, too. She had seen it. The demon provoked after so many times wronged. After being beat and kicked and scorned. After being denied what it already knew. No justification in his actions. No one could excuse what he did to her, anymore than she could excuse what she did to him.

It felt good, beating him up for loving her. For making her love him back. Convincing. He was the incarnation of her suffering. Of her stubborn realization of such blatant wrongness. And after a while, he couldn’t take it. The caged animal begged for reprise. She had used him, and it killed her because she knew she could never willfully give him what he wanted.

This all emerged after time, of course. After a while, Buffy could continue without thinking about it. Without reflecting the adolescence of her mistakes. She had tried hatred and failed. Resentment. Her body ached at night with remembrance of what almost concurred. It hurt. It hurt that she could push someone who loved her with such leisure unbiased to go to such extremes. For a long while, she thought it was a reflection of his demon. Of what he was and would always be. But not so. It was more that he had changed for her, and loving her without any sense of retribution had forced his darker side to emerge. And the minute he realized it, what he had nearly done, he left and never came back.

Until now.

It hurt. They hurt. They hurt each other. That’s the way it was.

She hadn’t consciously admitted that she loved him yet. It had taken years simply to forgive. Years and a shoulder to cry on. Willow was always there. Always understanding. Always ready to say it was all right to cry. All right to miss him. All right to forgive.

A day so long ago etched tightly in her memory. Standing in the Magic Box. It was shortly after Willow returned, and they were counting inventory. Then, innocently, her friend had glanced over, noted with confusion the coat hanging over her shoulders, and asked, “Hey…isn’t that Spike’s?”

That was all it took. Buffy had abruptly dropped whatever she was holding and dissolved into tears. The wealth of confusion welling inside was enough to electrify. Desperately, she was coaxed into Willow’s similarly misplaced embrace, spilling the awful truth of her resentment and disorder onto her healing friend’s compliant shoulders.

“Do you love him?” she had asked.

“No,” Buffy had replied. “No. How can I? After what he did? How can I love something like that? How can I love a demon, Will? How can I love something that’s evil? How can I love something that hurt me?”

The look on Willow’s face had gone distant, vague but understanding. After a long minute, she shrugged and offered, “I don’t know. But Buffy, it’s all right if you do.” A painful echo of Tara’s reassurance, spoken what felt like a century before. Buffy had bit her lip and nodded, and didn’t speak on the subject further.

That was all the direct talk they had shared about Spike over the past three years. There had been moments of understanding, but never blatant discussion. The night at the bookstore when she discovered a poetry collection with his name on it, and Willow’s sharp consideration followed by an almost immediate purchase. The night Buffy phoned her in a panic because the duster was still at Xander’s, and she knew he would recognize it if it weren’t attached to her shoulders. The previous night, when she lurched into her friend’s embrace and was accepted without question when informed that Spike was back in town. Last night at the Bronze. Minutes ago at the Magic Box. All there. All welling inside.

In truth, Buffy was surprised that it had taken Spike so long to hurt her back with all the pain she had inflicted without retaliation. She had allowed herself to forget what he was—and more importantly—he had forgotten what he was. That night in the bathroom was a steadfast reminder. They couldn’t forget again.

The graveyard was in sight. Buffy drew in a breath and held it. She pulled the duster tighter around her body, then looked down and realized how it would appear if she stood in front of him wearing his coat. Resolution gave way and she reached to pull it off—paused—then wiggled back inside its protective embrace. Though she never thought of it as hers, truth of the matter was, she never went anywhere without it on her shoulders. She felt safe inside its sheathing. All more besides, he had seen her wearing it at the Bronze—there was no point in a cover up.

At last she released her breath, eyes closed tightly. A thrill ran up her spine and she shook her head clear. It was time. No turning back.

Patrol, she told herself. You’re just out patrolling. You might run into a vampire…a blonde vampire…but hey…there are lots of vampires out there. I—

The sound of a shrill scream perturbed the air with blunt intensity. Buffy was forced out of her reverie, all sense of vigilance stripped before she could blink. Abandoned of her reserve, she took off in a bold run, producing a stake rolled up one of the sleeves.

“You’d think after a while that people would stop taking midnight strolls through the cemetery,” she quipped between pants. The scene before her was expanding and she had entered the gates before she knew it. It was instinct now—her thoughts forgone all except the repetitious save the girl mantra that hummed within her cavity. She leapt over headstones and was ready to dive into battle when her stomach flipped in the sense of a very familiar presence lurking nearby. It paralyzed her with unconcealed recognition.

Spike was there, unaware of her proximity. Two vamps had already begun to feed on a midnight snack—neither terribly bright. Buffy watched in stunned awe as he grasped one by the head, twisted, and in mid-process, kneed the other in the gut. If the scent of blood pouring from the victim’s neck distracted him, he did not let it show. Instead, he lurched forward and seized what looked like a stick lying next to a gravestone, rendering the second vampire a cloud of dust within seconds.

It wasn’t as though she had never seen him kill his own kind before. Spike was a demon and loved violence as much as the next person. But the look on his face was genuine concern. When he was certain there were no other vampires in convenient propinquity, he heaved a sigh and helped the girl to her feet. Buffy saw dribbles of blood rolling down her neck.

“Tha—thank you,” the girl said dazedly, her body quaking. “I don’t know how to…or what to say…I…he bit me, I…”

“Don’t worry about it, luv. Here.” Spike reached into his back pocket and produced a handkerchief, tenderly applying it to the angry spot at her throat. “Right crazed buggers,” he said, a bit too casually. “Probably escaped from the loony bin or somethin’ like that. You’re all right now.” He held the cloth at her neck until she understood that she was welcome to it. “Feeling woozy at all?”

“A little.” She smiled weakly, taking a few steps away.

“Got someone you could call? I’ll walk you ‘ome, but—”

“No…I can make it. Live right across the street.” She indicated the direction with a nod. Buffy gasped and ducked out of sight. “I’ve been taking this shortcut for about a week now…between here and work. Don’t think—”

“I wouldn’t do that. Damn wonky folks come out ‘ere and cause all kinds of badness. Won’t always be someone ‘ere to help you.” When she thought it was safe, Buffy raised her head and peered over the headstone. “Right then. Better be on your way, chit.”

The girl flashed him a grateful smile, stopping every few yards to look back, even though he never did. Both were long out of sight before the Slayer thought to rise to her feet. If she called out after him he would hear, but she didn’t call out. Her inner rationale screamed it would was growing more difficult the longer she put off their inevitable meeting, and though this only bought her minutes, her will forbade any other course. If anything, Buffy wanted a controlled situation—someplace where she was guaranteed quiet reflection. The graveyard offered no such sanctuary.

Drawing in a deep breath, she shivered and sank further into her coat, trying to piece together what had just transpired. There was no mistaking the peroxide vampire, but Spike wasn’t one to save people out of the kindness of his unbeating heart. Buffy shook her head. The past two days had offered a list of things Spike had never shown interest in but had constructed into cold habit for his everyday schedule. Spike did not make negotiations with the Council. Spike did not write poetry. Spike did not research. Spike was not Giles’s friend.

Buffy knew the answer was simple. She also knew that she likely had a grasp on what it entailed, but headstrong ignorance overruled commonsense. There was still a very real inkling of doubt. If adequately provoked, would he lash out? Would he sneer? Would he show his true colors?

Would he try to hurt her again?

Despite the façade of goodness, there were so many inconsistencies to regard. A warning long dead cast by an old lover sprang to mind with treacherous results. Once he starts something, he doesn’t stop.

But he had stopped. He stopped for her.

Would that be enough? Was it enough?

There was only one way to know. Buffy shook her head, clutching her stake with fearful insistence before following his darkened path into the shadows. This was it. The test.

No turning back.

The crypt was deficient of all sense of luxury. When previously resorted to such tidings, William had done everything he could to make his living condition as comfortable as possible. There were no elements of home here. He knew better than to make himself feel too relaxed. Though he hadn’t endured a state of such utter barbarity in several years, the implication failed to bother him. He was accustomed to the darkness, to living in shadows. It was almost refreshing: he had always taken pleasure in sins of the flesh, and never shied from the opportunity to make himself at ease. Now the drive was gone. Even the notable lack of a telly went unattended. Darkness was soothing and appropriate.

He had saved a life.

William smiled tightly, studying the intricate patterns of thin fibers in construction by a spider in the corner. The life saved wasn’t his first, he knew, but it surged his weary body with pride and satisfaction. A woman was alive because of him. Because he had been there. Because he cared.

The sense of compassion made the situation unique. Beforehand it was all for show. Demons generally didn’t make habit of rescuing mortals, a rule he amended in effort to please and earn the favor of the Slayer. Always fueled with selfish motivation. Not so anymore. After causing so much hurt, it was the least he could do to compensate for years of joyful carnage. There was a lot to make up before, and even if he lived to see the end of the world, it would never be enough.

Granted, the end of the world was likely just around the corner. Again.

An inward twitch cautioned him too late of an approaching presence, and William felt himself go numb. Dryness stretched his throat, all sense of fulfillment leaving him for the face of instantaneous sorrow. He knew she was coming today, knew what she told Red and herself, but there was no way he could have been ready. Not for the first time, he found himself at an immeasurable crossroads, not knowing which path was the safest. He didn’t want to see her—his body ached with need, but he could not wish it so. What would he see when he looked in her eyes? The same confused desertion reflected the night before? No—she was stronger in the face of challenge. If she was here, it was because she was prepared. And no matter the setting, she held the advantage.

She always would.

Without further reserve, the crypt doors flew open, and Buffy Summers paraded through. Even if he had prepared, any effort would have been rendered useless at the pivotal moment. His body drained of feeling, and all he could do was stare. She looked wonderful. Eyes wide, blazing with unquenched fire, hair long—flowing. Skin flushed, chest heaving, stake ready in hand. A visage of rose red death. Her expression was unreadable; flame withering slightly when she saw him. Whatever conflict he read was likely manifest from secreted hopes of the ever-fictitious happy ending. William swelled with an excursion of overwhelming emotion. He refused to let himself cry.

For seconds, they stood in silence, both heaving for air out of need and habit. A war of doubt crossed her face. She looked him up and down, up again, deep into his eyes, trying to see. He, in turn, was distracted by treacherous detail. The duster he had pulled off his second slayer complimented her nicely—as though it was made for her and no one else. When their eyes met again, the period of analysis was over. All that was left was fire.

There was venom in her voice when she spoke—harshness that would have ended him had he not heard the falsity behind it. William drew in a sharp breath, biting the inside of his cheeks. Whatever pain was there was caused at his hand. He wanted so desperately to reach for her but didn’t dare for all the world.

“You know,” she huffed, lip quivering. A similar fight to control her emotions blazed with startling intensity. “For someone who once told me that I wasn’t worth a second go, you sure are persistent.”

Parry and thrust. She was grasping at straws so blessedly unattached to anything that resembled himself three years ago. Nevertheless, any arbitrary barb from the past to suggest spiteful fault on his behalf tugged at the strings of his heart. Whatever she said now had the potency for great hurt.

“Buf—”

“No. No words.” She would have been more convincing had her voice not cracked. When he looked up again, the stake was poised and ready for the final blow. Her eyes betrayed her will. Without needing confirmation, he understood it was for show.

One last release.

“Spike, you’re a killer,” she spat, eyes darting everywhere but home. She was trembling. “And…a…a rapist.” He flinched painfully but didn’t look away. Anything that came out of her mouth was deserved. There was a surprised blink at his indifference before she regained tenacity, drawing her arm back further. “And I should have done this years ago.”

Aching familiarity coincided with her words, and he had no trouble placing it. William nodded slowly in wry acceptance. It was full bluff, and he understood that. Final closure. Perhaps mapping their endless distance. Or maybe he was wrong and she did intend to end it. Here. Now. A sense of righteous justice.

But Buffy’s eyes burned with emotion, revealing herself for all that consecrated indecision. Last night’s visit from Red had hurt more than this. Maliciousness was expected. Forgiveness was unbearable.

Closing his eyes tightly, compliant of his deserved fate, William nodded in release. “Do it,” he replied at last, an air of sacrament passing through his body. “Bloody just do it.”

“What?”

“End my torment. Seeing you everywhere. Everyday. Feeling you wherever I go, no matter what I….” William’s eyes opened but shot downward as he stepped back, offering his chest as the stake’s trusty sheath. “Went to London and it didn’t help, even with a sodding ocean between us.” With that, his gaze caught her again, true to his invitation. “Told Ripper not to…” A breath. “Just kill me.”

She was on the verge of tears but would not retract her deception. The stake was unneeded—the torn and reluctant empathy flowing through her eyes doing more damage than any weapon ever could. He bit back another swelling emotional outburst. Empty promises that all would end well filled his chest, and he nearly scoffed at the connotation. Lies wouldn’t do.

William expected her to withdraw—anticipated it. But he did not imagine experiencing a rush of loss when she lowered the stake. The thought was dismissed and shoved into the far recesses of his mind. Craving death would do him little good, especially with the new danger arising. However, the retreat of her tangible weapon bought the expense of another reaction—something he never fathomed and couldn’t grasp.

With a strangled cry of burdened surrender, Buffy launched herself forward, grasped his head and lowered his mouth to hers. William was too startled to react at first, bones rattling with earth-shattering release. The fleeting notion that he was dreaming occurred and was rejected for lack of caring. If it was a dream, he wished never to awake. Growling his capitulation, he hungrily returned her ardor with passion he never again thought to feel. Their lips bruised each other: eager, sad. When he reached to grasp her shoulders, she let the stake fall to the ground, enabling her to pull him closer, desperate and needy. Hot tears stung his cheeks but he didn’t know if they belonged to him or the bundle of trembling flesh caught in his embrace.

Somewhere in the back of his mind, warning bells sounded, echoing into long vacant chambers. A flash, and he saw her sprawled on the bathroom floor, thrashing against him as her sharp cries of protest perturbed the dream-like atmosphere. He heard them but didn’t register the intent. Didn’t listen. Selfish need drove his plight and his will knew to obey nothing else. Sharp pangs filled his empty cavity, and even as his turmoil was not shared, he could will himself to submit to rapidly escalating desire.

Slowly, William reached behind him and took her clasped hands in his own, unwinding them from his neck. Similarly, he indulged a painful gulp, retracting his lips from hers before drawing in a breath. His gaze drank in her startled confusion, though aimed at whom he didn’t know. Assaulting him with a kiss had obviously not been her intention. Spontaneity was wonderful like that. He didn’t know if she had made things better or worse.

The void in his chest expanded with the loss of contact.

When it became intolerable to look at her, William turned away, hands finding purchase at his hips, body wrought with strangled tension. “I can’t do this again,” he confessed softly.

He heard her draw in a breath, menace having vanished from her tone, leaving sorrowful understanding. There was an air of familiar disgust at her actions, as well. Familiar. It sent a sharp pain across his chest. “I know,” she replied at last. “I can’t, either.”

Without turning to face her, he shook his head and fixed his gaze on his footwear. “Why are you here?”

“I…ummm…” Her thoughts were distorted—confused. Every fiber of his being urged him to pivot and express his similar misplacement, but he couldn’t find the will. He thought he would break if he looked at her again.

If he saw those eyes that weren’t rightly filled with hate.

“I came…Giles…Willow…we were talking…” Buffy’s voice trailed off again, regarding him with pleading modulation. “Please turn around.”

“I can’t.”

“Why not?”

“Can’t look at you.” William heard the feeble quake in his tone and ineffectually berated himself. “Hurts too bloody much.”

“You can’t look at me?” She was shooting for anger, and while the sting hit its mark, there was lack of feeling behind it. “Do you know what it took for me to come here tonight?”

“Yes.” Still he did not turn. Couldn’t bring himself to face her. “Wicked unfair, I know. I just…can’t.”

“Spike.” There was sharpness in her voice. Commanding. “Turn around.”

A fervent shake of his head.

“Spike!”

“I can’t bloody look at you, Slayer.” He heaved in debate, shaking his head again. “Not without wanting to stake myself.”

A reverent pause of consideration. The next breath trembled, and he heard her kneel forward, pluck the stake from the place she had dropped it, and shuffle back to her feet. “There,” she said with resolve. “The stake is gone now. All temptation away. Look at me.”

William sighed once more, smiling at her simplicity. “Buffy, I—”

“Look. At. Me.”

It pained him, but there was no denying her. With a breath of resignation, he finally turned and met her eyes. The vibrant splay of conflicted shooting behind a tear-blinded scabbard crumbled his resolve into bits of nothingness. Again the urge to comfort was great, but he didn’t dare budge. It wasn’t his place, or his right. So he stood there, watching her as bits of himself wore away. Pain touched every dead nerve in his body. His skin tightened over weary bones. It hurt. It hurt to look at her. To look at her and not see hate.

No hate. But no trust, either. No stirrings of forgiveness as Red had suggested, but there was compassion. A reason, a want to understand.

More than he could have ever hoped for.

And it nearly killed him.

“There,” she said at last. “That’s better.”

William flinched again at the lack of any sort of resignation.

“Now…I want a straight answer.” Buffy puffed out a breath, expressing difficulty maintaining eye contact. However, she admirably managed to fulfill her participation—she had demanded his eyes and would not risk losing them over her own selfishness. “Why did you come back?”

William scoffed and edged away, looking down but not turning. “There is no straight answer to that, pet. Bloody hell, don’t I wonder.” He shook his head and met her eyes again. “Shouldn’t be here. I know that. Won’t pretend it otherwise. Mostly because Ripper asked me to come…noted wackiness was about to start again. Bad wackiness. I came ‘ere because he needed my help.”

“That all?”

“’S what I tell myself. ‘S what’s easiest to deal with.” A sigh rolled off his body. “I came because he said I could help you.”

She nodded, though her gaze crackled with disbelief. If anything, she wanted to believe. She wanted answers for all untended questions. “Why didn’t you tell me it was you on the phone when I called London?”

“Don’t rightly know,” William retorted honestly. “I heard you…I knew it was you before you spoke. I just…too hard. It was too hard. At the time, it didn’t seem to matter that I’d be seein’ you in a few days. I jus’…I’ve seen a lot of badness, luv. Been through a bleedin’ lot. Comin’ here’s taken stones I didn’t think I had.” He chuckled humorlessly. “May not still. I guess we’ll see.”

Buffy’s eyes narrowed a bit but she nodded just the same. He could practically see her mind scrambling to find another inquiry. “Why are you working with Giles? You two never exactly struck me as buddy/buddy.”

William smiled sadly in repose, shaking his head and taking a further step away. It wasn’t an act of distancing—he used movement as he used words; expressing stress or comfort. Finally he stopped, taking a seat on a slab of stone. The invitation was there for her to do the same, though he was not complacent enough to voice it. “Trust me, pet,” he answered softly. “I never thought I’d see the day, either. Ripper’s a tough old git. Hell to get along with, but a right old chum when things get messy.” A look of intense fondness seized his features. “I owe ‘im a lot.”

These were obviously not the explanations she was expecting: filled with unquestionable sincerity. With every word he spoke, he could see her sinking into further confusion and doubt, never coming closer to her coveted answer. The single explanation that put all others to shame. It was there, radiating behind his willing eyes for her to see. However, he understood her indecisiveness. As always, Angel was annoyingly intuitive. Chances were some part of her knew already. It was a matter of recognition, and he refused to spell anything out for her.

Similarly, it was her right not to accept the evident change. He wouldn’t presume to take choice away, even if choice coincided with ignorance.

And the questions kept coming. “Would you have come if Giles hadn’t asked you to?”

“Not likely,” he retorted truthfully. “Didn’t think my being ‘ere would help you at all.”

The unspoken inference made them both twitch in discomfort. Buffy drew in a breath and held it, looking around as though for the first time self-conscious.

Silence stretched and teetered.

“Willow is glad you’re back,” she said finally, wrapping the duster tighter around herself. “Whatever you two talked about last night…I don’t believe I’ve seen her that relaxed in a long time.”

William smiled, cold skin flushed with unexpected warmth. It was a good, sincere smile—and he saw her reflect the realization with astonishment. As Spike, he hadn’t had reason to smile without inevitably twisting it into a smirk. A true smile was rare. She had seen them, of course—usually when he was inside her. He had never had reason to smile before, most certainly not when a person was mentioned as being happy. Spike simply never cared.

Especially if that person wasn’t her.

“I’m glad,” he said at last. “Poor Red. I should have…” The words been here formed effortlessly, and while he believed it, a very real part of him could not will it so. “Done somethin’. Maintained contact, or whatnot. Been there for her an’ all. She needs someone from the other side, and I’ve had my fair share. Done things I’d…” Another flash to that awful night. William’s speech abruptly stopped with insinuation. If they traveled that road, she would know immediately. There was no way he could talk about what almost occurred without choking on remorse. For the briefest minute, he felt himself slip back—as though stationed at the beginning of a caucus race. “I can’t,” he finally gasped. “I’m…”

Buffy took a step backward, eyes flaring dangerously. “Don’t. I don’t want to talk about it.”

“I don’t either,” he agreed.

Direct contradiction. There was no way not to inexorably talk about it. “Never say you’re sorry,” she whispered.

William’s eyes widened. “What?”

“I can’t do this. I can’t pretend anymore. We both know better. Don’t…don’t lie to me.”

A part of him screamed and died. How could she think that? How could anyone walk away from doing that to the person they loved more than anything and not immediately crave death? It didn’t take a soul to initiate that sort of compunction. He had never hated himself so fiercely as he did that night. “Buffy, I—”

“Don’t!” she warned sharply, taking a step back.

“No. Let me say this an’ I…” Her eyes pleaded him, offering a much-needed glance at her breaking heart. Then he understood, and he had to remind himself again that he possessed not the privilege to go to her. They stood miles apart and would likely never find the other at a point of reasonable comprehension.

Tears clouded her gaze. “Don’t lie to me.”

She didn’t want lies and she couldn’t handle the truth. What was there to tell? They sank into further silence, heavy and confining.

“Did you miss me?”

William’s eyes snapped shut. In seconds, her tone had softened—fire quenched by an internal cold shower. The alternative to one extreme. Slowly, his body calmed. Funny that he should need it to calm, as it bore no heart rate or pulse. “So much,” he replied, making no attempt to mask his pain. “But I wouldn’t’ve come back. Never. Not on my own. Even if old Ripper started thinkin’ straight an’ kicked me out for good. And as soon as this Master thing blows over, you won’t hear from me again.”

The honesty behind his words made her wince. Then it grew awkward. A sense of finale. The end.

It was the truth. These next weeks would be their last. And despite rationality, William didn’t know how to feel about that. London had presented the safe hold of never believing he would see Sunnydale again. Now that he was back, the thought of leaving acted both as a growing comfort and similar dread. Their conversation was becoming increasingly difficult to endure.

“Spike.” Buffy’s voice drew him immediately to the present. That tone was grave and reluctant. They were talking about the past again. The past he couldn’t bare to think about. “I know I just said…but I don’t think we can’t not talk about what happened before you left.” A cringe of acknowledgement. She pursed her lips and drew in a deep breath. “I was angry, hurt…I—”

“And you should be,” William replied, sitting up sharply and at last turning to face the wall. There was no objection from her end. “You can’t…bloody hell, Buffy, just hit me and leave. Stake me an’ have it over with. I can’t take this.”

She blinked. “What?”

“I came ‘ere with the knowin’ that everyone would rightly wish I was a pile of dust. Figure’d to be dead now, or…” Violently, he whirled to face her, minutes away from tears. “Or worse. ‘Stead, Red warms up to me. Hugs me to sodding oblivion, all the while telling me that you don’t hate me like you should.” A growl tickled his throat. “So if we’re going to talk about it, then let’s talk. But no fancying up the truth. Tell me you hate me, Buffy. Don’t drag it to the bleeding end.”

“I don’t hate you.” He choked a sob at her honesty. It pained him more than he could bear. Ostensibly unmindful, she continued, “I don’t know what to feel anymore. What you did hurt me. I never thought that you would do that. I lied to you before. I had grown to trust you, and that was what hurt the most. That I trusted you, and—”

William could no longer hide. The stillness of the crypt rang with the abruptness of his sob—just one. It startled her, brought her own tears closer to home, but she went on. He understood that she needed to go on.

“I handled it wrong.” It was becoming progressively more difficult to speak. “Everything. None of that should have happened. But what I did to you…I hated myself, and I took that out on—”

“Stop!” he cried desperately, unable to endure anymore. The words if you loved me you’d stop came from nowhere, undeclared for the likely continuance of painful apologies. She had to know how she was hurting him, lest she would not say such things. “I can’t bloody take it.”

The dying spark flared to life behind her eyes. Her patience had worn to its end. “For Chrissake, what happened?” Newly uncovered edginess slapped him across the face. A prolongation of her ignorance. She lived there happily. Buffy stumbled over herself, looking at him hard. Trying and failing to see. Tears dropped on occasion, a few. The escapees before the deluge. “You’re so…”

“I’m what?” Unable to tolerate their distance any longer, William stalked forward, grasping her shoulders. He wanted to comfort and yet found himself shaking her, as though trying to knock sense into her unwilling conscious. The act itself was not violent; he couldn’t make himself hurt her if he tried. The floodgates opened and she could no longer hold back—joining him in his tears. “I’ll tell you what I am. I’m a monster, Buffy. The Big Bad. You forgot it once. Bloody hell, even I forgot it once. I was happy thinkin’ I could be one of you, but that led down the road of wackiness and bad doings, and the delusion is over now. I can’t change—you were right about that. I’ll never change. I’m a demon. A nasty, evil demon.” He released her when he could no longer look at her, sighing and stepping away. At times, his temper frightened him. The thought of losing control again rattled his senses beyond comprehension. “You should go,” he said softly. “You shouldn’t ‘ave come ‘ere.”

A few seconds passed before Buffy found words, filled adequately with the sounds of mild crying. “I shouldn’t have,” she agreed. “But I had to. And had you come back three years ago, I probably would have had to chain myself up to keep from doing something I’d grow to regret. Like staking you. But you didn’t come back. And I…”

“You what?” His voice was barely above a whisper. He couldn’t manage more.

“I grew up. Took me twenty-five years to finally accept fault, but hey, here I am. You hurt me. But I hurt you, too. That was wrong. And I’m so—”

“Get out.”

A new desperation hit her voice. “Spike—”

“Get out. Out of here before you say somethin’ you’re sorry for later.” William huffed a breath and turned one last time to face her. “Don’t apologize to me, pet. Ever. I can’t…” He broke off and pointed at the crypt door. “Just get out.”

An uncomfortable silence settled over them. The air stilled, long, preserving an emotional tenor. The sound of her breathing distracted him, wary, the taste of her still filling his mouth. Being this close was unendurable, and it was only prone to get worse.

Buffy finally shuffled, tearing her eyes from his, offering a nod of concession as she began her retreat. It wasn’t over. Such things were never over. She paused once more, inches from the threshold. When she spoke again, her tears were not betrayed by her voice. It was business, and she would treat it as such. “If you’re here to help us, then come to the Magic Box tomorrow. We’ll need everyone there, and I’ll make sure no one…tries to…”

“I’ll be there.” A hard promise, but he would not take it back. “I’ll come with Ripper. We need to…it’s all about to start, luv. No matter what, I’ll be here till it’s over or I’m even more dead than usual.” He attempted and failed to smile. “Couldn’t keep me away.”

“Then we’re finished here.” The door cracked open and she was gone before he heard her farewell. “Goodnight.”

Three seconds ticked by—then he fell to his knees, unable to contain the aching swell in his chest. It was good to cry. Cold tears rolled against colder skin. Had he maintained any reserve, he would have heard a voice outside his door—an outburst that rivaled his own.

The minute she entered the graveyard, Willow’s chest constricted and she drew in a deep, desperate breath. It was as though someone had seized her lungs and abruptly cut her air supply. The quiet air offered free-range hearing over a still landscape. She had heard Buffy cry enough to recognize the sound of her pain.

However, before she could reach the scene, the Slayer raced passed her, hand over her mouth. They shared a fleeting glance, then she was gone—bolting for the shadows, a place the Witch dared not follow. Her arms rumbled with emotion and threatened to drop the sack of groceries—namely blood and Weetabix—she was delivering on Giles’s behalf. The wealth of impassioned vibes perturbing the night made her want to sink to her knees, but she forced herself ahead. If Buffy were so disturbed, it was safe to assume Spike was a mess.

Her stomach twisted in concern. His state the previous night was heart-rendering. True, it had improved as they progressed, but he was still miles away from self-reconciliation. It was unwise to leave him alone.

A darker twinge rose—unbidden—to mind. If Buffy had said something to send him back, she didn’t know what she would do, but it wouldn’t be pretty.

As Willow neared the crypt Giles had indicated, her obstinacy diminished. Without warning, she burst through the entrance, dropping the sack of goodies dead where she stood.

“Oh God!” she cried, rushing to the crumpled vampire’s side. Sharp jolts of pain shot up rapidly numbing legs. Spike curled into her embrace immediately, seeking her out, clutching to her with startling need.

“What happened?” she demanded, anger, unstoppable, seeping into her voice. “What did she do?”

For long minutes, harsh sobs were her only reply. And she sat there with endearing patience, rocking him to some unforeseen haven, breaking just at the feel of him. Finally, drawing in a raspy breath, he gathered control and attempted to speak. “She forgave me,” he gasped. He might have said something else, but she couldn’t hear beyond sobbing growls and tremors. Minutes passed before he regained authority, calming slowly until he was just a cold armful, rocking back and forth in her hold.

Timidly, mindful of a reprieve, Willow planted a motherly kiss on his forehead, drawing away blonde strands of hair. “She what?”

A long pause. She thought he might have cried himself to sleep, but he stirred in time, heaving a sigh. “Not in so many words,” he retorted groggily. “Didn’t let ‘er. Couldn’t. But, Jesus, Red…if she ever does say it…” Tears were welling in his eyes once more, and his arms tightened around her. “She can’t, luv. Can’t ever let her forgive.” At last he lifted his head, breaking her heart in two. “I think it would kill me.”

Willow’s eyes watered and she struggled to find words. There was so much to say, so many empty promises to make. She wanted to tell him that it would only be hard for a little while, that eventually things would brighten, and forgiveness was the answer to life’s qualms. Yes, it hurt like hell, but it was what he needed and deserved. All anyone could hope for. Love from the person he hurt the most, because honestly, a pardon of that magnitude could not be founded on a heart filled with hate. She knew. She had seen forgiveness for things so awful it made her ache inside. The same reason Xander, Giles and the rest forgave her. The same reason Spike had forgiven Buffy for so many wrongdoings. The very reason the Slayer nearly forgave him tonight.

However, those words wouldn’t come. Not now. Not now when it would break him. So she sat in silence, holding the healing vampire long after sleep claimed him, long into the night. For all the sensibility in the world, she couldn’t bring it within herself to leave him alone.

Chapter Thirteen

The night passed slowly and brought with it a slower morning. Gratuitous activities satisfied fleeting curiosity, but there was no force great enough to drag her thoughts away from the heart of the crypt. Her encounter with Spike had rendered her evening sleepless, those aspects of normality filled with nightmares of mimicking nature. Whatever she did, her mind wandered to the words he had spoken, the looks he had issued. The familiar and yet oh-so-different feel of his lips against hers. Buffy’s motivation for their kiss remained unexplained and mostly ignored. She thought it best not to think of it. A clumsy, spontaneous temptation. It hadn’t made anything better.

Another rendezvous that afternoon at the Magic Box. Buffy arrived an hour early, strung on stress and kept from a depression of sleep only by the wonders of coffee and diet soda. Her personal life was too complex now to deal with another apocalypse, and with as much as her priorities should be settled, she couldn’t stray from the peroxide vampire’s presence.

He said he would leave after this was all over. It was what she wanted. It was best for everyone. It made her ache every time she considered what she would be losing—again.

Then of course, there was that debate of what exactly she would lose. After last night, she was anything but certain.

The Scoobies would arrive soon. It was still a while till sunset. Angel wouldn’t show his face for some time, likely after everyone had gathered and discussed. Though he was just as capable of navigation during day lit hours, it was Spike’s cold habit—not his.

One of their many distinctions.

If anything, Giles would be on time. And a vampire would be with him.

Buffy exhaled a trembling breath, ineffectually ignoring the wealth of questions that tightened her stomach into knots. How would she look at him? Who would she see? There was no denying that the vampire she knew was gone, leaving behind only a glimmer of his former confident swagger. How much had changed exactly? What had happened?

She was at a loss for what to think or feel. After everything passed between them, everything that had happened, she didn’t know how to approach him. Talk to him. Their last exchange burned the need for reparation in her lungs, stronger than it had been before. Stronger than ever.

After seeing him like that, she needed to apologize with a thousand times the impact. Needed to let him know that there was no need for this hurtful self-punishment. Needed to forgive and be forgiven.

She needed him to know.

The bell over the door announced a new arrival, and she looked up in time to see two familiar faces push through the entry—both on either side of a human-shaped blanket. When all respective presences were acknowledged, the air thickened in tension. Giles cleared his throat and helped Spike further inside, murmuring a quiet hello. Buffy looked to Willow and her heart broke. Never before had she seen her friend so thoroughly torn. Loyalties were split in two, and she didn’t know who possessed the larger half.

That thought terrified her.

As soon as the blanket was removed, she huffed a breath of release. Spike didn’t so much as look at her—his frontage all business. Instead, he shook his head and glanced around, familiarizing himself with the layout though the reminder was likely unnecessary, and finally bolted for the books. “You think that’s it, then?” he asked Giles, who traded uncomfortable glances between his vampiric colleague and the Slayer. No reply was issued or really expected.

“Makes sense, mate,” Spike continued, moving back, flipping through a volume that hadn’t seen clean air in several years. He didn’t react to the dust. “That chap I saw attacking Nibblet the other night, the blood on ‘im was as black as I’ve seen. Appears black in the moonlight an’ all, but I know the difference. ‘Sides, after so many years, this Master bloke has given so many bleedin’ clues. We shoulda caught on back home.” The Watcher and Willow regarded him oddly—uneasily. When he could no longer avoid her, Spike glanced up and nodded. “Buffy,” he acknowledged before returning his attention to the matter at hand.

She nodded but didn’t reply. There were no words.

“This wasn’t impulsive,” he went on, turning the text so Giles could see. “Black to start the darkness. The sodding beginning. This guy looks to be a fanatic for sigma hocus-pocus. He’s been teasin’ us these last years. Waitin’ for us to catch on, all the while tossing random Revelation demons to distract you—” He tossed a fleeting glance in her direction, “—‘an laughing about it all the way.”

The Watcher frowned, flipping through the pages. Seeing him behind the game when any form of research was concerned did more than unnerve her. Giles was supposed to always have all the answers. “I don’t see anything about black blood,” he replied finally. “We’ve gone through this, Wi…” He looked up, a deer-caught-in-headlights glance that she didn’t pay attention to. “Spike. We’ve been through every book prophecy has to offer.”

“Read between the sodding lines, Ripper.” An aggravated vampire moved to look over his shoulder, pointing at a passage. “See. Looky. ‘And the dark times will come with the second arising. And everything he touches will be tainted. And as the time grows nearer, those who fight will fall. Those who fall will die.’” Violently, he commanded Buffy’s eyes. “Not all your vamps have bled blackness, have they?”

“No…” She was still too startled seeing Spike in research mode to absorb the potency of his words. A patient pause, and finally his gaze softened. She shook her head with a blink. “No. Just some.”

That was all he said to her. Flashing his attention back to Giles, he indicated the text with another firm point. “There. You see? Prat’s been feedin’ for years. Gettin’ his strength together. Everyone he sires is tainted. Makes ‘em bleed his bloody blackness.”

“Say that five times fast,” Willow offered pointlessly. Everyone looked at her questioningly and she shrugged. “Sorry. Thought we could use some comic relief.”

Spike grinned at her fondly, shaking his head before looking back to the book. “An’ sounds like he’s been a busy ponce—getting as many as possible,” he said, unhampered in lecture. An indiscernible flash blazed through his eyes as the Watcher’s face fell with comprehension. The vampire growled and began an aggressive pace from one wall to the other. “Been ‘ere the whole bloody time. Here!” He indicated the Magic Box with expressively wide arms. “I’m such an idiot. Shoulda seen, shoulda—”

“It took knowing about the prophecy to understand,” Giles said at last. His skin had paled and his body was quivering. “If we had seen it before, we never would have made the association. Not without the Council books.” Spike slowed in stride as outrage calmed, nodding mutely.

“Either way,” the Watcher continued, “you were right to pursue research. None of us would have known had…” With an emotional pause, he met Buffy’s eyes. “And you would never have seen it coming. I…”

Everyone looked to Spike, who shuffled in discomfort. “Now,” he said, tone considerably softer. “That’s not fully right. You woulda seen it. It’s what you do, Ripper. You—”

“I never would have gotten those books. That was you.”

The vampire scoffed. It surprised Buffy to see him shy from praise, especially if it was deserved. He refused to meet her inquiring eyes. “They would’ve sent ‘em along as soon as things started going wonky.”

“The point—”

“Right. I got your point.” He looked to Willow, who offered a slight smile. “Got it good.”

“Spike to save the day!” she cheered humorlessly, earning another wry glance from every direction. “All right, all right. Enough with the comic relief. I give. Just a thought.”

“Right, Red,” he retorted with a snort. “I’m just…lucky shot, that’s all it was. Bloody Council. I’m just annoying git who can’t keep his mouth shut. After a hundred an’ thirty some-odd years, it’s certain to do me some good.”

The Watcher nodded in agreement. “Can’t argue with that. William the Blabbering Bloody.”

Spike snickered. “William Ripper II.”

“First one’s better. More accurate.”

“Ponce.” He was grinning. “Who says you get to make up nicknames?”

There was familiarity between them. It was as though he was a different person altogether. Everything was there—pieced together for her. At her scrutiny, Spike became unwittingly self-conscious. Stripped and exposed. She saw…

Willow suddenly cleared her throat and moved forward, ushering the vampire with her into a protective corner. “Here they come,” she warned. “Xander and Dawn. I don’t think they’ll…you know, give you too much trouble. Both Buffy and I laid down the law pretty well the last time.”

“Yeah, you told me.” The look on his face betrayed him. Buffy had never seen him so self-aware. “Don’t want to see Nibblet. Harris I can handle, but—”

Willow was acting suspiciously delicate with him. With as much as they mentioned each other in passing conversation, it occurred to the Slayer that she had never played witness to one of their exchanges. One would assume they were life-long friends that shared sibling-related affection. “Don’t worry about Dawnie,” she assured him. “What she says, she doesn’t mean. Like yesterday, she said something…bad. But I could tell—she cares so much for you.”

“Shouldn’t.” It was barely a whisper. “Don’t defend her, pet, or try to excuse her. Whatever she dishes can’t ‘urt me. Not—”

“Can’t lie to me, Mister,” Willow retorted with a stern ‘yeah right’ expression, stepping aside and silencing as the entryway opened. They shared a quick glance.

Perhaps it was the mood, but Buffy couldn’t help a rush of the same anxiety, as well as the desire to preserve Spike’s feelings. An odd sensation. It awed her that he could act like nothing had changed when she could not think of anything else. Their brief glances were sharp and painful. She had to bite her lip to keep from screaming her fill of unvoiced apology before he could stop her again.

“Hey guys!” Dawn said chirpily. She carried a shopping bag that dropped from her arms, though it was impossible to detect whether the display was in ode to the weight or the pair of eyes to which her gaze was magnetically drawn. Xander’s hand came up to grasp her shoulder. “Spike,” she acknowledged emotionlessly.

“Afternoon, Bit,” he returned with a nod. “An’ Harris.”

“Spike.” There was no front of feeling behind his tone. “Nice of you to show up.”

“Yeh,” the vampire agreed. “Figure’d it might be useful.”

“Spike has discovered something rather disturbing,” Giles interrupted, stepping forward. “This prophecy we researched evidently commenced some time ago. Your vampires that excreted black blood were sired by the uprising Master.” The announcement stole whatever mocking retort had perched on Xander’s lips. “He has been gaining power since after I brought Willow back from London. I fear he would have arisen without warning had we not decoded the books. It would have been far too late.”

Spike sighed and backed further into his corner. If anyone noticed the chumminess between himself and Willow, they declined comment.

“This vampire is of an older order than time,” the Watcher continued. “He makes endless ancient references and resorts to imitation of biblical text. It’s mocking in that sense. A deity’s act to throw you off his scent.”

“I dreamed about him,” Buffy said softly.

The room fell still.

Xander retracted his hand from Dawn’s shoulder, stepping forward. “And we’re just hearing about this now because…?”

She looked fleetingly to Spike, who regarded her with wide-eyed concern. “It slipped my mind.”

“What happened?”

“Well…ummm…” She sighed. “It started off as…something else. Then everything switched to the Master…almost everything. It might not even be a Slayer dream. The entire thing was sorta inconsistent.”

A frown creased Giles’s brow. “Tell us. We should never take your visions for granted. You know that.”

Buffy wasn’t about to share all the details of her subconscious, but she knew Spike understood what it entailed for the way her eyes wouldn’t leave his. Whether the result was intentional or not, she wasn’t sure. But regardless, he knew. His features contorted in grief, but the affect was fleeting. He wasn’t about to let Xander see his misplacement.

The Watcher was exhibiting several uncharacteristic signs of impatience. Emphatically, he stepped forward. “What did the Master do, Buffy?”

She shook her head clear, blinking furiously. “He killed…then he bit me. Said something…Latin, I think. ‘Vae…vae puto deus fio.’ That’s it. And that was the end.”

A beat passed before the vampire and Giles simultaneously came forward. It was impossible to decipher who first yelled, “Bloody hell!” but she was sure they weren’t in unison.

“Not good,” Spike grumbled. He was pacing again. “That’s not bloody good!”

“What?!” Panic shot spurts up her insides. “I mean, I gathered it wasn’t all birds chirping and daffodils, but what does it mean? Someone?”

The vampire exhaled vibrantly, stopped and looked at her. He would give her honesty, even when it pained her. Never did he shy from what she needed to hear. “It means the baddie’s comin’ for you, and he’s lookin’ to be a bloody god.”

“W-well, we already knew that, right?” Dawn offered, bravado betrayed by a quaking voice. In seconds, her eyes had gone as wide as saucers. “I mean, no extra badness?”

“Oh, there’s plenty of badness,” Spike retorted, looking at her for the first time with indifference. “There’s a whole walloping load. And it’s just itchin’ to hit.” Fiercely, he turned his gaze to Buffy. “Chap’s gonna get most of his power from you, I’m guessin’. That phrase, it means ‘Bugger help me, I’m turning into a god,’ only more poetic. Damnation an’ all that in one package.”

Xander’s prejudice was vacating his esteem with every lingering beat. Studiously, he looked to the vampire, eyes wide and questioning. “But we’ve stopped this sort of thing before,” he said. Buffy didn’t know if he was trying to convince the group or himself, and at the minute, it didn’t seem to matter. “And I don’t just mean before, I mean like every other day.”

“Master’s different than all that,” Spike replied. “Angelus knew more about the last one than I did. He was all about those soddin’ prophecies and rituals. It was never my thing. Old git through a bleedin’ temper tantrum when the poor chap got his soul back.” He paused meaningfully in offering of comment, continuing when no voice rose. “Hell god’s a bitch to put up with, I know, but she’s no brassed off vampire of the oldest order. What it boils down to is the order of what this time is set for. You lot have seen your fair share. More than you rightly should. And this one’s been festerin’ for some time now. What vamps you all ‘ave killed won’t ‘mount to much in the long run. He’ll have what he wants an’ how much by the time he aims to strike.”

“It’s the end of the world as we know it,” Xander sang miserably.

“Nix the comic relief,” Willow offered when he looked aghast at the irritated gazes aimed from all directions. “I’ve already tried that.”

Voices mended into one magnanimous tenor, carrying on conversation that Buffy was no longer following. The breaths heaving from her body were becoming tight—constrictive, as though each was closer to her last. Her eyes met Spike’s and held, whispering strands of unspoken understanding. It was too hard—too hard to focus on the very real prospect that her life might end—again—all the while trying to delve passed the complex layers of her personal life. In that, she realized Giles was likely wrong in bringing his working colleague with him for help. Spike’s presence was distracting her. Briefly, she wished he had arrived the way she remembered him. At least she knew how to respond. Confident and ballsy, making barbs at her friend’s inconsistencies and mocking goodwill while trying, however insincerely, to prove that he had it within him to do the same. This New and Improved Spike was too confusing, too complex. He researched and he cared and he was helping for the betterment of the world, not because of her. Not just because of her.

Exhaling deeply, she rose to her feet, eyes still trained on him. Talking continued around her, but she didn’t care. Her question had one objective for its answer. “When will it happen?” she asked.

Everyone grew still, suddenly fixated on the exchange. She twitched uncomfortably but did not waver in resilience, refusing to look away. Their lives might as well be a soap opera—everyone had to see what happened.

“When it’s the ten year birthday of the past Master’s death,” Spike replied, obviously shaken. “He’ll come and he’ll wait and he’ll do really bad things. You’ll fight, and if everythin’ goes to prophecy, he’ll best you and the world’ll be his playground till the next one stops ‘im. But even that might be in a hundred years or more.”

Buffy pursed her lips and nodded. “Wow. A prophecy telling me I’m going to die. Knew it was that time of the month.” A pause as she bit her lip, thinking. “Then I guess I got a date for the prom. Who says you can’t go back to high school?”

“Prom’s on a different day every year,” Dawn reminded her.

“And the Master will likely attack you when you don’t expect it,” Giles added unhelpfully. He looked miserable.

Buffy snickered. “Yeah. Like I won’t be going around all day not expecting him to pop around every corner?”

“I won’t let it happen,” Spike offered softly. “Not while I’m ‘ere. He wants a bad to mess with, let it be me. One of us prats’ll go into the soddin’ earth, and I’ll be bloody damned sure I’m not that prat.” Then, before anyone could venture a word, he grabbed his blanket and raced out of the shop, not noticing the sun had set. He nearly knocked Angel aside in haste, ignoring the bewildered gazes burning into his back.

An uncomfortable silence was left in his place.

“I take it I missed something,” the new arrival remarked.

No one voiced a reply. Buffy barely acknowledged his entrance. Thoughts were colliding in sorrow and confusion. The dream she had the other night clawed at her insides, and immediately she jittered in concern. He knew, of course. Even if the others didn’t, he knew what she wasn’t saying. Again, the horrible image flashed before her eyes, a visage of Spike combusting into dust. She fought her feet to obey and stay planted, allowing her better senses to convince her that he would be all right.

“He’s just upset,” Willow said softly, speaking to everyone though she was looking at Buffy. It was reassurance, cornered with the same conflict, and she was astonished at the veiled realization pouring through her friend’s guise. The notion of acknowledged shared concern had shaken her in some way; the words she spoke now calming, but doing little to alleviate the twinge that whispered that the Slayer should follow the disturbed vampire. With a sigh and a sad smile of displacement, the Witch concluded, “Can’t really do much damage tonight. Besides, the Master hasn’t arisen yet.”

“Is it just me,” Xander said a beat later, “or has Spike gone ooper creepy with being the new ‘know-it-all’ guy?” He then looked to the newest vampiric addition and waved when he saw no one else would. “Hey Angel. Guess what? The world’s gonna end…again.”

The Watcher groaned lightly and turned his attention back to the books.

Ignoring the welcome, Angel looked instead to Buffy and took several heady steps forward. “Why did Spike leave?” There was no hint of indictment, though she couldn’t help but feel accused.

“Presumably to get himself killed,” Dawn replied. “Won’t have any luck tonight, though.” The previously harsh coldness had vacated her tone, perhaps permanently, and she was back to sounding beaten and torn between loyalties. She looked desperately to her sister. “E-even so, you won’t let him, will you?”

“Don’t worry,” Willow said softly. “He’s just going to vent. You know how he gets.” The last rang unconvincingly. As of the late, no one, save Giles, really knew how he got when he was upset. “Probably kill a few vamps then hit the hay. Or go to Willy’s for some blood.”

The Watcher looked up and frowned. “Did he eat what I gave you last night?”

“Yeah. Fell asleep then woke up and scarfed it down, then fell back asleep.” She made a face. “It was kinda gross.”

There was a chuckle, familiar and reassured. “That sounds about right.”

“You stayed with him last night?” Buffy asked. She didn’t know whether to feel relieved or invidious. Their growing closeness was an area of relief and jealousy. Though she had Spike had had a fair share of heart-to-hearts in the past, she received the notion that he had never opened up to anyone as he did with Willow.

Closeness with Spike was something she told herself she never wanted. Now it was what she craved more than ever.

“Yeah. Well, not all night. Just until I knew he was…you know…” The Witch looked down. “Okay.”

“Buffy,” Angel said softly, advancing a few more paces. “Can we talk in private?”

For the briefest instant, she thought he might have regressed to the mindset displayed the other night, but his eyes told a different story. With a hesitant nod, she heaved a breath and followed him into the back, leaving everyone to bask in uncertain aftermath.

When she caught up with him, the dimness of the room took her by surprise. She had never before noticed how quickly the sun set. He did not seem impartial to the darkness, so she did not offer to abolish it. Light was not needed here.

“What has Giles found out?” he asked softly. Small talk. He hadn’t brought her back here to discuss matters that were of everyone’s concern.

“Spike found out, not Giles,” she answered dutifully. “You woulda been surprised. He saw beyond the text. It’s bad…this thing. The Master.”

“I take it you found Spike last night?”

A notable pause. “Yes.”

“And?”

She shrugged. “And we talked.”

Angel smiled lightly at her evasiveness. “Buf—”

“Is there a point to my being back here, or are you just going to jump start another lecture?” When his eyes widened in invitation, she growled her annoyance and turned away. “I’m so tired of this! Everyone is being secretive! I mean, what you told me at the Bronze the other night…it was wrong but rational. It was what I expected from you. I’m used to it. But now…”

He frowned and stepped forward. “You’re upset because I’m not lecturing you?”

Buffy stopped, frustrated, shaking her head sternly. “No. I’m upset because Spike’s back in town. It’s finally getting to me. You want God’s truth—there it is. I’m upset because everyone I trusted suddenly has this colossal secret that no one is sharing. Everyone he’s talked to…even you! Especially you! You went on and on…and on and on about how demons never change. How Spike never changes. Then what? One chat with him put your entire belief system out of whack and suddenly he’s not such a bad guy?”

The way he looked at her suggested that she had finally lost it. A sort of ‘stop and listen to yourself’ regard. But Buffy was lost in her spiel, insides reaping of secreted knowledge, denied in logicality again and again. Something scratched beneath her subconscious. Something known.

And Angel understood. Blinking in recognition, he nodded and stepped back, excreting an uncharacteristic breath. It almost went unnoticed until she remembered whom she was with, and she immediately regretted the lack of illumination. She knew he could see her eyes and hated being rendering read when she was so far behind, herself.

At that minute, he looked at a loss for words, at a complete loss at what to say. Though she couldn’t see much, there was definite disguise in the works. Taunting. And despite how she tried, she wouldn’t get it out of them. Any of them.

“I think,” he said finally, “that I was wrong about something.”

“Someone alert the press,” Buffy stingingly retorted.

He ignored her, stepping forward. “I saw Spike going to your house, and I think I was ready to kill him, despite what you said. Or at least thrash him around a bit. My demon was itching for a fight. I know him, much better than you or Giles or anyone can claim to. You didn’t spend a century with his annoying antics. What stopped me was something sincere. I’ve never seen Spike express a sincere feeling before. With him, it was always about killing, eating, and screwing. You know that enough.” When she nodded her reluctant confirmation, he continued. “He did change. He…wanted something that was impossible for him to want, even more impossible for him to have.”

“Me?”

“No. Well, yes, but not just you.” Angel was edging dangerously close to revealing the secret of the century, and unfortunately, he recognized it the minute she did. With an aggravating step of retreat, he shook his head, forcing himself down another pathway. “Do you love him?”

Buffy drew in a sharp breath and looked down, shaken and surprised. The question mockingly echoed a similar inquiry he made years ago, though with implications she never thought could exist. There was no time to make up excuses, or tell herself any thought of love was impossible. Straightforward honesty was what he expected, what he would read her even if her mouth told him otherwise. “I don’t know,” she whispered. “I don’t hate him. I don’t…I don’t know. He’s so different now. And too much has happened. What he did to me…can I trust him? I want to, but…” Her eyes were drawn home. “Love doesn’t work without trust.”

“That’s not what you told me.”

“When?”

“Long time ago. Back when you were in high school. When you—”

“Asked you about Drusilla,” she finished for him. “I remember.”

“So you can answer my question, now that trust is out of the way.” Stubborn as always. She wanted to kick Angel and run but remained stationary, daring him to ask again. “Do you love him?”

“I don’t know. How can I love something like that? We hurt each other. So many times. How can I love the hurt? What does it make me?”

“A sadistic monster lover.” The words would have stung had she not noted the lack of maliciousness behind his smile. “And human, Buffy. I’ve seen a lot. In my experience, humans love the wrong people for the wrong reasons.”

The passiveness in his voice was so thoroughly Angel that it sent ripples of aggravated adoration through her body, reluctant and most certainly unwanted. “Why are you so level-headed? I thought you hated him.”

He shrugged. “I do. But I love you, and I…I don’t want you to deal with more than what’s necessary. You have too much going on right now to worry about Spike.” A long, reverent pause. “What are you going to do now?”

Buffy huffed out a breath and brought her hands over her eyes, drawing her hair back tightly in thought. The answer wasn’t long forming—they both knew her intentions long before it was voiced. “What I do best,” she conceded as she turned and paraded for the door. “Follow the vampire.”

Surprisingly, the Magic Box was vacant when she reentered the main room. Again, she took time to note that it was unexpectedly dark for being so early in the evening. However, the sky remained clear; she could see through the windows. No storm clouds on the horizon—just the impending threat of a big awakening.

Buffy sighed and instinctively tightened the duster around her. Though she had no way of knowing for certain which path the peroxide vampire had taken, she was nearly convinced he would be at the graveyard. The feral look in his eyes as he left suggested more than the need for protection; it had all happened too rapidly. One minute he was there and the next he wasn’t.

“When in doubt,” she murmured to the silence, “follow your tingly.” Doubly checking to make sure she still had a stake or two on her, Buffy sighed once more and started for the entryway.

“It got dark fast,” a small voice came from the shadows, stopping her with a start just before she could make her exit. It was Willow, seated near the cash registers, shrouded in darkness.

Buffy frowned and turned, heart leaping with surprise. “Good God, Will! Trying to give me a stroke?”

“Oh. Sorry.” Familiar sheepishness inevitably set in. “I just…I wanted to say someth…where are you going?”

She snickered and rolled her eyes. “To find Spike, where else? I need to talk to him.”

“Yeah,” the Witch agreed. “I don’t mean to keep you—”

“No. It can wait. Go ahead.”

There was a heavy intake of breath and she moved from the counter, still not coming entirely into view. “I just like…realized it after he left. I saw your face, and I realized what a bum I’ve been lately. It’s not like I’ve been angry with you or anything, but it’s felt like it.” A heady pause and another sharp breath. “I was doing all right, Buffy. I mean, I’m not peachy-keen, no, but I was doing all right. Better and stuff.”

“Willow, if this—”

“No, no. Let me finish. When I found him the other night, he was like…everything I am, you know? Only Spike doesn’t hold back when he’s feeling oogie. The whole world knows.” She chuckled dryly. “Even when the world doesn’t care. I never thought that…I’ve felt pain. I mean really hard-core pain. Pain that’s not even mine. I felt him as soon as he got here. Like a…a leftover. He was screaming for someone, Buffy. And I’ve been really protective of him ever since.” With another sigh, Willow looked down, escaping her friend’s confused gaze. “So protective that it’s started to cloud my judgment. Tonight was kinda the eye-opener. That I was being protective for the wrong reasons when I saw how worried about him you were after he left. And don’t you deny it, Missy.”

There was no want of denial. “It was the dream,” Buffy whispered. “I dreamt the Master killed him.”

Immediate panic beset her friend’s eyes, ineffectually tempered in some attempt for calm. “Oh…but, you’ve had dreams like that before, right? Where you thought someone might die but they didn’t?”

“Yeah,” she replied softly. “That’s what I keep telling myself.”

“And the dream…made you react like that? I mean, it’s not like everyone and their cousin could see, but you…”

“I do care about him, Will!” Buffy snapped. “I don’t know why, or how, but—”

“But you do, you see, and that’s my point. I couldn’t. I couldn’t see it. All of it. I mean, I knew, but I didn’t know.” She looked confused, but shook her head and continued. “These past few days have been more about me. Me feeling better about what happened. Me trying to make amends. I know what he did was awful. I mean, really awful, and I don’t mean to push you to…you know…not love him but, get to the point where you can tell him that everything’s all right.”

“You weren’t pushing me.”

The Witch chuckled again humorlessly. “I was. Just not very well. I just thought…if someone like Spike could be forgiven for everything, why not me?”

There was a pregnant pause. Long, teetering, then Buffy came forward and took her friend into a hug, holding her calm in the darkness. “You were forgiven,” she assured her. “I know that—”

“No. No, you don’t.” Willow pulled away, drawing an arm to wipe tears from her eyes. “Forgiveness is a two-way street. You guys forgave me, sure. And it hurts like hell because I haven’t forgiven myself. It hurts so much it…I did…” She paused to catch her breath, holding a hand up to signify her need for space. “I guess it hurts because I didn’t really realize until I came home how fortunate I was. Here, I’d done this really, really bad thing…and you guys were a little weird at first—sure—but things gradually started going back. We got things fixed. And here we are. It takes special people to do that. To love and forgive like that.” She sniffed. “And it hurts to think I almost, that I could have…”

“You didn’t,” the Slayer said firmly. “We’re here now and everything’s all right.”

“No, not everything. Not anything. Nothing’s ever all right around us, Buffy. You’re confused, hell I’m confused…worried more about making things all right for a vampire because of some serious inner reflection. And I have miles to go before I’ve recovered. But I’m getting there…one step at a time.” Another sigh and her tension finally started to dissipate. “Oh, wow. I feel better. Needed to get that off my chest.”

Their hush was reflective and brief, and it occurred to Buffy in those few precious minutes that there was a very real part of Willow that she would never understand. A part of her where they had once shared everything. Where the silence lived. And while her dealings with Spike could be construed as impossible to fully grasp, lest she cast herself down that path of self-destruction, she was relieved there was someone who understood. Someone for Willow who could touch the part of her that died three years ago. Someone who might someday be able to bring her back to the space so long ago abandoned.

“Things got crazy last night,” Buffy admitted after a trying pause, knowing instinctively that she would get nothing more from her friend, and it was too painful to press. “Or at least…hard. With Spike, I mean. I don’t know what I expected, but it wasn’t what I got. I don’t know who I’m talking to anymore, Will. He’s so…”

Willow’s eyes widened. “Oh…he didn’t? I mean, you don’t? …and you still?” A wave of compassionate understanding washed over her, and when the Slayer flashed a look of undermining confusion, she stepped back and gasped. “And you still were…oh, wow. That little worm! Go. Go, Buffy. Find him. He can’t keep avoiding you.”

A surge of discovery charged through her trembling form, and she neared, eyes burning with intent. “What do you know?” she demanded, all sense of reserve vacating her without authority. “What happened to him?”

“Find him,” she replied quickly, a haunting mimic of her intonation the day before. Only now her irritation had curbed, angled more toward the bleached vampire. It was a look and tenor Buffy knew well, identifying immediately with one of Willow’s top five pet peeves: procrastination. “He’s trying to dodge the issue. Or you. You deserve to know—and he needs to be the one to tell you.”

Buffy’s heart raced, mind unwittingly expanding to dangerous, unexplored terrain. She was on the edge of something but her will forbade an unguided tour. A portrait of Blanche Dubois—backing away from the moments of significant recognition for the chance to happily thrive in her fantasy world. However, she couldn’t stay there forever, and the Witch saw. With a quaking gasp, the Slayer found herself hastily steered to the door. An unspoken compromise. Whatever had to be discovered tonight would be with him. Not here. Not like this.

“Go,” Willow said urgently.

And before either could offer another word, Buffy was gone. Tearing through the exit, running toward the pivotal point of her instincts.

All secrets would be revealed tonight.

Chapter Fourteen

The sky should not be pitch black at 6:10, but it was. With the impending nature of her tryst looming ahead, Buffy found it soothing to focus on things so blessedly unrelated to what was coming for her. She had no idea what she was going to say when she found him, but she was certain there would be tears.

And apologies. If nothing else, tonight had to bring her that sanctified release. There was so much to discuss. So much to get behind them. And she wouldn't let him shoo her away this time. Pride could not be sacrificed for the sake of comfort. These adolescent distractions would wind up killing her if she wasn't careful.

As she suspected, he wasn't hard to find. He looked as he did before he left, save the splattering of blackened essence on his clothing. The ground beneath him looked a little worse for the wear. It surprised her that he hadn't paced himself into a trench.

Spike sensed her move toward him, and while he slowed, it was only minimally. He drew in a breath when he saw her, gesturing an angry hand to the sky. "Sodding blackness. Shouldn't be dark this early, luv."

Excreting a sigh, Buffy forced herself to relax, approaching him with deceptive calm. "You think it has something to do with what's going on?"

"I'd say so. Far too early for the sun to go to bed. Not that I'm complainin'. That blanket's a bloody pain." At last he stopped, shaking his head. "But a good number of other vamps will make a hay day out of it. Nummy people treats everywhere. Already killed me three of 'em." He gestured to the stains on his shirt. "An' more'll come. Just give 'em time. I don't like this at all."

She nodded, more to herself. With all they had discussed in the shop, she didn't feel like treading down the path of 'events to come.' All more besides, Willow's words rose sharp within her cavity, and she recognized their meaning. Though Spike appeared composed, he was obviously shaken by her presence, avoiding eye contact and moving about to find a comfortable place away from her. He had behaved the same upon entering the Magic Box just an hour before.

She wasn't about to dally with small talk. That was well and good for Angel, but she didn't play those kinds of games. And up until the recent, her vampiric companion didn't, either. "Right. Spike, I didn't come here to-"

"Abandoned the Scooby meetin', did yah?" His gaze was trained on the ground. "Sorry 'bout the leave. I was jus'-"

"Don't interrupt me. I'm tired of this." That coaxed him to look upward, slightly panicked for the face of things he did not wish to discuss. It only encouraged her, fueled her voice and put more words in her mouth. "These games... whatever you're trying to hide." She sighed, looked down, then up again. "Spike, I know something happened. It's pretty obvious. I mean, yeah, I don't know what, but I'm not dense enough to completely miss the signals. You've changed."

"Demon, pet," he replied slowly, as though she were a child, though there was dread behind his eyes. "I thought we covered this last night. I'm a demon. We don't change. We never change."

Her eyes narrowed. "When did you start preaching that crap?"

"Heard it from you a time or two, dinnit I?"

"God. You pick now to start listening to me?" She saw his amused, fond smile and grew all the more aggravated. "I'm done. I was done before we started. If you wanted me to believe something else - well, too damn bad. I saw enough last night to know... you're different. I don't know how, but-"

"Sure you do." The drastic fall of his voice caught her off guard, and the jesting tease had left his eyes. "You must. You wouldn't let me this close to you if you didn't."

"What are you talking about? I-"

A drastic breath of concession. "I thought I could run away," Spike whispered, and she felt a rush of relief surge through her. At last he was going to share. It hadn't been long, but it felt like years. She wouldn't allow him leave until she had all the answers. "From you. From what I did. I made it all the way to England, and even then, there you were. Following me. I started workin' with Ripper to... to try to make things right. I'm drawn to you, luv. It took realizin' that I hadn't changed to change. Took... doing..." He swallowed audibly, taking a seat atop a headstone, "what I did. An' what I did... I was so angry. I'd been kicked and beaten - rightly so, an' all that. An' I've been angrier than hell. Wanted to kill you a time or a thousand, but I never, never thought I'd get so... out of control. Wouldn't 'ave hurt you for the world, pet."

Tears clouded her vision, unwanted images springing grudgingly to mind. "But you did," she whispered, moving to sit beside him. Neither could afford to look at the other. "You hurt me so much."

"Didn't mean to," he repeated, staring at a patch of darkened grass beside his boots. "Luv, if you never believe anything else, believe that. Can't say 'I'm sorry.' 'Sorry' doesn't cover it. They've'n't got a word enough for it."

"I don't know if I can do this," she confessed, shaking her head. "I don't even know you any more. How can you... after everything that's happened. I've told - or tried to tell you - that I'm sorry for what I did, and-"

"Don't," he warned. "Please don't."

"Well, it's the goddamned truth!" Buffy jumped up, angry suddenly. She needed to be where she could see him. Stubborn eyes were fixed still on the grass, magnetically pulling his head with them. "It's so hard for me to say, and your new little righteous act isn't helping. Do you think I like this? I hate it! I hate being sorry. I hate knowing that I was wrong. You're... evil, and you always will be, and I'm sorry for what I did to you. So sorry it makes me hurt inside. All the while you sit there and tell me that you can't be for what you did to me. And I should hate you! I want to..." When she trailed off she was rewarded with his gaze, half-imploring her to continue, half-begging her to stop. "If you didn't mean to, then why would you ever?" A drop of water rolled lazily down her cheek. "Why would you... hurt me so... so much?"

Spike's breaths were coming rugged and harsh. It was obvious he wished himself miles away. Again he dropped his head, and she knew he was close to tears. That was another difference. A Spike that wept openly - without hindrance. She watched his muscles constrict, hands digging into the stone beneath him. Dust rattled beneath unpolished nails. It would crack after a minute. "I couldn't hear," he whispered at last, refusing to look at her.

A last pitch of dying anger blazed through her, commanding Buffy's better senses, tackling her vocals and spieling through a throat dry with tearless nights and coated in thick regret. "What do you mean, you 'couldn't hear'? I was screaming at the top of my lungs! By God, I'd never screamed so much in my life. Or did the kicking and thrashing and pleading turn you on, you sick-"

"All I saw was you." With heart-breaking simplicity, Spike looked up. His eyes reflected years' worth of love she had never had the right to doubt. He had loved her as faithfully as any man ever could have, even when she tried to make it impossible. "And it consumed me."

Night nestled around them. Not much time had passed, but already it felt like hours. With a quivering breath, she nodded at last and took a seat beside him once more, tugging his duster tighter around her. It was subconscious habit; the coat was always wound around her, as though she feared prying hands would snatch it from her.

"So what happens now?" she ventured to ask, unsure if she was prepared for the answer.

"We beat the big evil," he replied, rolling his shoulders and exhaling deeply. "Do what Ripper and I came 'ere to do. Then I go back to London, look up things in dusty old books, and wait fer whatever baddie decides to attack you next." A sad, humorless grin spread across his lips. "Won't be back, luv. He was wrong to bring me. All I've done is cause you more trouble than you oughta be foolin' with right now. You got the end of the world to think about, and 'stead you're sittin' here with me, bringin' up all the achies of the past."

Buffy pursed her lips, reaching out to clasp his hand where it remained untended in his lap. She watched his eyes close tightly at the contact, drinking her in as she admired the long-missed feel of cold skin beneath hers. This touch was more intimate than what they had shared in the past; even that spine-tingling kiss she had welcomed him home with the night before. Just sitting here with him, hand in his, enjoying the premature night.

The moments of peace they enjoyed together in the past were numbered. Never had she let him get so terribly close. He could be inside her and still distanced for her unwillingness to let him in. She had always revoked his attempts to express tenderness. The courtly warmth that burned his eyes as he brushed strands of hair away from her face during the throes of her release. The way he could spend hours caressing her skin when he thought she was asleep, as though trying to convince himself that she was actually there. The touches he would steal when she was awake; a sweep of her cheek, a gentlemanly kiss atop her head, an affectionate nibble at her neck. All touches she craved though rejected. Always too afraid to let him close. Afraid of what that made her.

Sitting with him now, holding his hand, giving him a taste of the gentleness he had so craved when in her presence, she didn't know if she was hurting him or making things better, and for the moment, she didn't care. She had missed this far too much to make judgment calls.

And then it hit her with all the tragic simplicity the world had to offer. The cindered burnings of a broken heart. A sealed doorway at the end of her mind suddenly unlocked and released a blessed string of closeted knowledge she hadn't before allowed herself to grasp. It engulfed her. Painful realization - hard to know and harder to accept. But there was no denying the truth; the truth she had known for so long. The truth she ignored for fear of her fate, the same truth she could no longer conceal for all its excruciating liberation. She loved him. She loved him with all her heart, and nothing: no birthright, no ancient siring, no colorful past filled with hurt and angst could ever wheedle that away. She could shed a thousand tears, feel her heart stabbed with a thousand knives, and tell him stop a thousand times, but illumination was there, and try as she might, it would never go away.

Unconsciously, her hand squeezed his tighter as understanding washed over, and she felt him reciprocate instinctually at first, then withdraw just as quickly. Spike looked sharply to her as the first tears dropped from her eyes. She could not return his gaze, could not bring herself to look him at him for the drive of devastating recognition.

"I bring up the past for a reason," she said softly. "It reminds me of all the things I've done. The good and the... very bad. And every time I think of you, I know that I... I was too selfish. You gave me the fire back, even though it was what I asked for, and I hated you because of it." Buffy paused meaningfully, drawing in a breath. The next would be the hardest to confess, but she had to. She had to now before she lost her nerve. It wasn't the first and the last, though something told her the will to speak would leave forever if the words weren't voiced. Now and finally. If she didn't push through those final barriers and signify the first true step into adulthood, this conversation, this night would haunt her forever. No matter how painful admissions were made. "I loved you then... and I still do... and I hate myself for it. I shouldn't... love you, I mean. After everything you've done, what I've done to you. You hurt me so much, but I still love you." The vampire was breathing rapidly, studying her as his eyes glossed over in tears. That wouldn't do. If he cried, she would join and never recover. Her foot stomped as she yielded to frustration. "Why? It shouldn't be like this. And I hate it! I hate that I can't stop. I hate-" And she broke down, sobbing into her hands, unaware that the presence beside her had moved away, fallen to the ground beside her, incapable of stopping a similar outburst.

And there they were. Star-crossed, lost, and sobbing over the same words, feet away from each other, unable to offer empty comfort. Confessions seethed the night air like a disease, causing more pain than relief, though it was difficult to decipher whom it hit the hardest. Finally, Spike struggled to his feet, wiping his eyes angrily. His look shot daggers.

"No, no!" he screamed. "Bloody wrong, Slayer! This whole thing, so wrong! Have you completely lost your marbles? You can't love me. You don't. I won't let you. I'm a dark, evil son of a bitch, and I bloody tried to rape you! I never did one good thing but finally leave you alone. Went across the sodding ocean to get away. To go somewhere where I couldn't hurt you. Ever again." At her puzzled look, he paused emphatically. "You told me you could never love me... I won't let you go back on that now."

"I'm sorry, let me?!" Buffy rose, outraged, and stalked forward, unable to stop the tears that flowed steadily still. They were inches apart. "You think this is fun for me? You think I want to love you? I hate it! But I can't stop. I pushed you away so much. I wanted you gone, and it killed me when you left. But you came back." She paused, voice overwhelmed with emotion. The tears cascading down his face nearly did her in. "You came back..." she repeated, as though trying to convince herself. And she couldn't stand the space between them. With a sob, she lurched forward, trapping his mouth with hers; wrestling kisses away until he groaned his defeat. His mouth was cold and fiery at the same time, his heated fervor surrendering to her completely. Then they were dancing, lost in the abyss of each other. Her hands were everywhere, studying every contour of his face, the softness of his hair, the firmness of his chest, pressed so heavily against hers. The weight of his arm crushed her against him, his kisses eager and responsive, tears flowing still for the inability to stop.

Buffy only pulled back when she had to breathe, sobbing still onto his shirt as her head found purchase on his shoulder, too caught up in the embrace to notice the way his arms trembled as he held her. The way he ostensibly couldn't stop his tears. Spike rarely covered his emotions in front of her, but he always seemed to have control. Right now he didn't, and it frightened her.

Then he rumbled against her chest, and she smiled lightly at the feel. The breaths he took feathered her ear, his wonderfully deep voice revealing his displacement. "How?" he asked softly, unable to stop himself from tugging at her earlobe with his teeth.

"I don't know," she replied honestly. "What does this make me?"

"Lost. We're all bloody lost." He buried his nose in her hair and inhaled. The arms that held her were still quivering.

"Can you forgive me?"

At that, he went rigid - statuesque. Buffy felt she was trapped in a stone, held tightly against him still, but eliciting no movement, no reaction of any kind. Then, without warning, he tore from her and resumed pacing. The expression on his face suggested anger, but he was not angry.

"Forgive you?" Spike finally spat, eyes glistening. "How can you ask me that? How can... I could have... when I think of what I did-"

"Didn't. You didn't do it."

"I could have!"

"But you didn't!" This was growing tiresome. "Doesn't that mean anything? It'll always hurt, but it's over with. In the past. We can't have a do over. I forgave you a long time ago, and-"

Her words were abruptly interrupted by a sharp outcry of pain. In horror, she watched as Spike burst into tears, falling to his knees and cradling his stomach. An image of true remorse. A man forced down the pathway of penance, to find some sort of reparation for a world of misgivings. And in that moment, in that lasting moment, she saw. She finally saw. The vampire. The man. The thing that left and never came back. Spike as she had never known him. Not hers. William. William the Bloody. There, harvesting Spike's body, speaking Spike's words, loving her with Spike's affection. But it wasn't Spike. For the longest minute, she couldn't breathe, couldn't blink. Her feet turned to granite, firm and hard against the ground. A void grasped her aching soul, and all efforts at a reaction fled her body. She stood there. Standing. Staring. At William.

When he looked up and saw she understood, his eyes went wide and he struggled to his feet. The fresh tears cascading down his cheeks glistened in what light the night had to offer. His breaths started coming heavier, forgetting air was not necessary, studying her, trying to pry away the layers she was concealing. "Buffy-"

That was all it took. Feeling coursed through her body with newfound liberation. Furiously, the Slayer stifled a sob and stepped forward, studied him briefly, then sent him to the ground with a firm blow to the jaw. "You bastard!" she screamed. "What did you do? What did you do?!"

"What I had to," he replied, tears running again. His back was to her, and he made no move to sit up. "What I needed to make sure that... never happened again."

"How?"

"Demon in Africa." He rolled himself over so he could sit, watching her, gauging for a reaction. But Buffy's face had fallen indifferently, and she was hiding herself again. "Left that night. Got me what I wanted... and I've been this way ever since."

Buffy bit her lip to ward another outburst away. "You... you asked for it?"

"Must've. It's what I got." He looked up at her pitifully. "I had to do somethin', Buffy. I couldn't... not after what happened. I couldn't live with that."

"Live?" she spat bitterly, only there was no venom. The anger placed there was artificial.

"I loved you and I 'urt you. I'm a demon, pet. Demons are supposed to do bad things. Evil things. But they're not supposed to love. Really love. And I never thought... killin' you would've been easier." With that, he struggled to his feet, eyes fixed on a headstone. He wouldn't look back. "I couldn't bleedin' take it anymore. You didn't love me, and I'd just done something terrible. The guilt 'urt worse then, cause I knew I wasn't supposed to feel it. I wasn't a man and I wasn't a monster. I was... nothing." He sighed and finally looked up. "Nothin's changed, o'course. I got myself to Africa, passed a number of nasty tests and was given a jolly prize at the end of it."

"Your soul," she whispered. The look on her face was distant; covered in remorse and disgust, though surprisingly aimed at herself.

William smiled sadly. "Got it for you. Asked for what you deserve. An' it's yours. It'll always be yours." When their eyes met again, he drew himself away with a hasty breath, shaking his head. "The first days were the hardest. Don't even know how I wound up in London. Then Ripper found me, threatened to turn me into a pile of dust, and saw. And he's... we've been workin' together since."

Buffy pursed her lips, clinched fists quivering as her body threatened to break once more into sobs. "He saw," she repeated. "And Willow and Angel saw... but I never did. It was so obvious. Why didn't I see?"

"Oh, you did, luv," he replied softly. "You just didn't want to believe it."

"Why? Why would I-"

"Because you didn't want to love me. You can't, you know, but you saw after..." William's eyes clouded again. "I shouldn't've come back," he whispered. "I never wanted you to know."

At that, she grew angry, but it was fleeting and died without a struggle. "You didn't... why the hell not?!"

"I wanted you to hate me forever - it's what I deserve. I knew it would...forgiveness is a hard gig, luv. And you... you can't. Can't mean it."

His words reflected Willow's painfully. The course of self-sacrament was a long and winding road, and he had more than miles to travel. He had years. He had an eternity. And there he was - this thing, this person that had sacrificed perpetuity of remorseless pleasures for the burden of guilt so wholly earned: an act that, in itself, unconsciously repented for every crime he had committed. A choice. A request. Who was he? There were plenty of shadows remaining to mimic his demon, but he wasn't the man she loved.

Was he?

A lasting look in his eyes satisfied any need for reprisal. Buffy's eyes welled with tears - tender and sore from her previous outbursts, but similarly incapable of preventing another. He needed love so desperately, even if he rejected it when offered. It hurt him to accept forgiveness, love, but he desired it still.

"I don't know what I mean," she said honestly. "Why didn't Giles tell me?"

"I asked 'im not to. I didn't want anyone to know."

"That's why you didn't want to come back?"

William shook his head. "No. Well, I s'pose in a way. It's been hell, just bein' here. Bein' so close to you. Livin' with myself, day in, day out. Thinkin' I'd progressed but knowin' I'm still stuck at the beginning. I can't stand it, luv. I can't stand to know I hurt you so much. I can't take forgiveness, cause I'll never forgive myself. I'll never accept love. I can't. It burns, baby. An' every time I look at you, touch you. Feel you near me; all I can see is what I did. What I tried..." He broke off, tearing his eyes away. "I didn't hear you that night, but I've heard you every night since. And it'll follow me forever."

Buffy drew in a breath and held it. A million thoughts collided into one massive jumble, and she found herself so misplaced that she didn't know where to start deciphering the pieces. She was too consumed with the thought that Spike - Spike as she knew him - had had it in him to do such a thing. To willfully initiate himself down the path of recompense. That he could love her so much. And now what? Was he gone forever? Who stood in his place? Not Spike, for certain, but someone. Someone that loved her with the same fervor. Someone that wouldn't touch her for knowledge of crimes he never committed. Someone with Spike's knowledge and memories. Spike's face and body. Spike's voice and eyes so full of life...

Someone who still, despite everything, was not Spike.

Why hadn't Angelus been good enough to want his soul?

A man in place of the demon. It was what she had wanted - told herself she wanted. Told him she wanted time and time again. And here he was - more a man than she could have ever thought or dreamt. Ready to endure an eternity of torment because of her.

Buffy's eyes clouded with tears once more. She was at a loss of what to think. Instantly, William stepped forward and took her face in his hands, though the tremor in his eyes told her it pained him to reach for contact. A thumb lazily brushed a tear away, and he smiled sadly at her, unable to cease his caresses. "Ad astra, per aspera, my sweet," he murmured.

She swallowed audibly, reaching to grasp his wrist, holding his hand there even as she saw the display of tenderness jolt pain through his body. What had he been putting himself through these last years? It was unbearable to imagine. All more besides the incident that inspired his boisterous transformation, he had a good hundred years and more to repent. The face of everyone he killed. Every man, woman, and child. She couldn't begin to imagine the suffering.

She had loved the thing he pushed aside. Did she love him too? Were they the same?

Leaning into his touch best she could, Buffy drew in a breath, closing her eyes as twin tears slid down her cheeks. "Do I disgust you?" she asked.

Predictably, he was taken aback, eyes going wide at first in confusion, then shock that she would ever feel the need to ask. "What? Luv, I-"

"You're not him. You're not the killer who stole your body for a century. You're not the thing that pushed me to the ground and... tried..." The same thing she loved. God, help me. "I told you... I love him. The thing. I love Spike. I love the thing that you're not." She wrenched free of his touch and looked at the ground. "It must disgust you. It disgusts me. But I can't..."

"Buffy..." When she refused to glance up, William stepped forward and aggressively seized hold of her shoulders. Funny how their roles had reversed. It wasn't too long ago that she had fought to maintain his gaze. "Buffy, look at me. I'm only disgusted by what I did to you. Nothing you could do would ever make me-"

"But you didn't! It wasn't you! You wouldn't..."

William growled and shook her once. Hard. "I've already gone through this with Ripper. Long willy time ago, but I did. Look, luv, I don't know who the bleedin' hell I am. I got all the touchy feelies ole' Spike left behind. I got a lot of him in me. Don't know how much, but I do. Also got a lot of that poetic ponce in me. Maybe the balance is what makes my writin' halfway decent nowadays. I feel bad fo' everythin' he did, but I know better than to think I woulda done it over the same way if I could go back, now. You though..." Lovingly, he drew her hair away from her eyes. The gesture blurred her vision with a fresh batch of tears. "You're the one consistency between the likes of 'im and the likes of me. Well, there's also smokes and Passions, but... you're it, ducks. That's why you sayin' you love me's so bloody painful to hear." Unable to stop herself, she reached to touch his lower lip, softly, exploratory, and he correspondingly swelled with another outburst. His arms trembled around her. The resolve he grasped now would fail him soon - eventually, whether in minutes or hours. A sigh quaked through his body and he willed his eyes shut. She could smell the salt of his tears. "Luv, please..."

"Do you still want me?"

Foolish question. The evidence was there enough against her. His eyes flashed open and he answered with intense honesty, "More than ever." It wasn't a matter he had to consider, though he obviously regretted the inability to shut himself up.

Buffy drew in a breath, studying his mouth as she neared. "Do you still love me?"

Another imprudent query. All it took was looking in his eyes to see. However, she also recognized that the words were stuck still in his throat. He wouldn't speak them now. Similar confessions would lead down a path they could not recover. Words were only words. She needed only to look at him if she required a manifest answer.

"Buffy, I-"

She grasped his forearms that still clutched her shoulders and again brought him down for an impassioned kiss. The first with William - truly with William. Fully William. Unlike the urgency of their previous moments, she took the time to explore him as though she didn't know this mouth so terribly well. Every stroke, every quaking breath - the hesitance with which he returned her touch, so needy yet so fearful. The moist taste of his tongue against hers. At last he surrendered to her, fully surrendered. With a growl of release, his hold became commanding, crushing her against him as his touch became deprived and possessive. How long they remained like that, she did not know, but her wretched need for oxygen eventually got the better of her. Buffy pulled back at last to take a gasp of air, head craned away as his lips unthinkingly explored her chin, her neck, her collarbone, fingers kneading at her shoulders still. Hungry and demanding.

Then, unexpectedly, the caresses came to halt, eliciting from her a small noise of complaint. Buffy found herself the next instant pushed to the ground, a frustrated but notably aroused William resuming his pacing. Back one, up one - the full journey twice. He stopped after a minute to look at her.

"Told you, luv," he murmured with remorse, "I can't do this again. I can't play at arms length with you. I can't..." He sighed meaningfully. "I can't look at you without remembering... it bloody hurts too much."

"But..." She struggled to her feet, ignoring the dust collecting at her jeans. "It wasn't-"

"Right. Suppose it wasn't me. It was him. Him who 'urt you, him who you love." He looked down. "That makes me nothin' to you. Again. A full circle an' still nothing's changed. Blasted unfair world, innit, Slayer?"

"Spike-"

"Don't call me that."

"Then what should I call you?"

The vampire smiled softly. "Ripper's gotten into the habit of callin' me Will. S'what the wankers at the library call me. William Ripper II." A chuckle rippled through his body. "There's a good tale. Oughta have your watcher share it sometime." When she raised an eyebrow, his mirth died instantly, seriousness returning for all its desolate undertones. "I've danced this dance with you a thousand times, pet. There are no happy endings for creatures of the night, or Slayers with an expiration date. I'll always be 'ere, in the same place. You won't."

"Do all souled vampires end up sounding like Angel?"

He scowled. "Had to bring the poof up, dinnit yeh? Damn prat's still a bloody pedestal."

A flash of anger rushed through her at that. "Now, wait-"

"I mean, in London, Ripper did the same thing. Wasn't his fault. He didn't know me." He looked at her significantly. "You don't know me. Hell, it's been three years and I still don't know me."

"Well life's just screwy that way!" Buffy growled in frustration and turned around. "If you're what I deserve, if your soul is mine, then-"

"I'm the carrier, and I gotta know how to use it." William sighed. "It hurts, luv. You 'ave no idea how much. To want you this bad. To look at you an' know..." He shook his head. "I can't see past what I did. Hurtin' people is one thing, hurtin' someone you love... I don't know if I'll ever forgive myself. Which is why I'm leavin' once the sodding Master is in the bleedin' ground." A half attempt at a smile. "'Sides, workin' with Ripper's somethin' I wouldn't soon give up. Old git's a right chum. An' I-"

"You'll be able to do that. Just leave?"

"Won't be easy, if that's what you're askin'. But cor, Slayer, what is anymore?"

Buffy nodded and took an exaggerated step forward. "Nothing. Nothing is ever easy for people who fight. That's the point. We live and we fight. And I don't..." She drew in a deep breath and took his hand, fighting a minute for possession but holding him grounded without much struggle. "I don't want to have to say goodbye."

A quiver spread through William's body, and he looked at her, predisposed, studying where they were clasped together. "How can you do this?" he asked softly. "How can you touch me and not want to rip me to bloody shreds?"

"Nothing's as it should be, Sp...whoever." Buffy shivered a bit, rolling her shoulders but refusing to retract her touch. "I'm not over it, I know. Sometimes I feel so... exposed. For what happened. But what I did to you..."

"You didn't do anything to me, pet."

"I sure as hell did!" Angry, she pulled her hand free. "I can't keep avoiding responsibility. I can't keep blaming other people for things I did, or should've done."

William shook his head, running a hand through browning bleached strands. "You were takin' the blame then, too. Said you shoulda stopped me a long-"

A frustrated growl climbed into her throat and she turned away in a fury. "Good God, would you stop bringing up things I said then? I was stupid then. Stupid and careless. I was also hurt, but so were you. I have to believe that, Spike. I have to believe that you wouldn't have done it without being so hurt. Because there's no way you could've gone and gotten yourself all souled up because you were feeling so peachy about life. Look at what you wished upon yourself!" Buffy collapsed tiredly onto the gravestone again, shaking her head with incredulity. "We need you here," she whispered. "Willow does, I know. And I do."

He placed a hesitant hand on her shoulder, offering cold comfort. "And Ripper needs me in London."

"Are you just telling yourself that because it's easier living there than here?"

"I won't pretend this isn't hard, luv." William shuffled awkwardly. "Listenin' to you, talkin' with you. Being so bloody close. It was hard enough with an ocean between us. Tryin' day in and day out to pretend I was normal-like an' human." A sigh heaved off his chest. "It won't be any easier over there, but God, I don't think it'll hurt so much."

Buffy frowned. "Does that even make sense?"

"Sure it does, pet. You just need to 'ear it from this end."

She emitted a long, frustrated sigh, shaking her head. "I don't... if you hadn't come back, things would be easier. I won't say differently. But God, I don't think I can... everyone leaves me, understand? I'm hoaxed. I'm-"

"Whatever 'appens here isn't your fault," he said austerely. "It's mine. My bloody mess."

"You're giving me the 'it's not you, it's me' speech?"

"You don't want this." A beat of irrefutable reproach. She felt at once exposed and vulnerable. "I don't mean to sound like the poof, but he was right about at least that. You deserve something above the wonkiness I 'ave to offer. Truth of the matter, luv, is that I'm not worthy of you. An' that's the way it'll always be. No amount of bloody goodness can ever make it otherwise." He sighed again and looked down. "Even if it could, I can't stand the thought of..."

"You're right, I don't want this." Buffy heaved herself to her feet and began a stride back to the gates, slowly. Willing him to stop her. He didn't. "I'm grasping at straws. And if you were... Spike... I probably would never have said a word of what I've said tonight." She smiled bitterly. "I couldn't tell him what he wanted. I can tell everyone else, but not him. Never him."

"You could've. You told me as much before-"

"No." Vehemently, she shook her head. "I knew something was up. Took three years and fifty-one days to figure it out, but I'm finally in the ball game. Even before you came back, I thought you were dead or something had happened... Spike couldn't stay away, even when we asked him to. And for the longest time, I told myself that's what I wanted. I knew it wasn't, but it was easy to live like that. Willow's the only one who ever knew differently."

He gestured to the duster. "No one else knows that's mine?"

"I think Xander does, even if he doesn't want to admit it." She smiled sadly. "Looks so much different on anyone else. If he ever saw it by itself, he'd know in a heartbeat."

"Looks better on you than it ever did on me." When she raised an eyebrow at him in silent reminder of his mirror-challenged nature, he scoffed and added, "Least I'd wager. It's a slayer's coat. Belongs on a slayer."

Buffy nodded and stepped further away. "I guess so." Without any sort of finale, the conversation withered. Goodbyes were too painful to endure, even if it was only until tomorrow. Each led to the last. Each led to the end.

"I'm so sorry," she whispered when she thought he couldn't hear her.

"For what?" The voice was distant - hitting a new note of immeasurable mourning. He hadn't moved. He simply sat there, watching her leave. Knowing he could stop her if he wanted to, grounding himself with resolve to keep from springing to his feet and sweeping her into his arms.

She paused appreciably, turned her head a fraction and murmured, "For making you do this to yourself."

"No one made me, luv. I asked for it."

"But you wouldn't have asked... if I had had the decency to tell you that night that I loved you."

"You were right not to. You shouldn't now. Doesn't make things any easier."

Buffy turned fully. William had taken her place on the gravestone, face contorted in grievous conflict and sacrament. It felt years had passed since she found him. There wasn't a doubt in her mind that he would wait there for hours yet to come, watching the unmoving graves. I don't know who he is anymore, she thought sadly. But God, it hurts.

He hadn't said as much directly, but she saw his unchanged feelings blazing behind tortured eyes. The man and the demon could love her with equal fervor. Could she love the man as well as the demon?

The night had already proven as much. An aching swell engulfed her heart.

"I can't lie anymore," she returned, eyes watering with the tears that would carry her through the night. "Lying's what got us here."

He met her eyes and understood, but he couldn't find the words to reply. Whatever he said had the potency of hurt, and there had been enough of that for one evening.

If there wasn't blood, there would always be tears.

Chapter Fifteen

Though her better senses commanded her feet to turn home, the scars burning her insides persuaded her pumping legs to pivot north instead of south. With every lingering beat that filled the gap between herself and the broken vampire, Buffy’s heart welled with embittered resentment, hurt mending slowly into betrayal. Chilled air collided with the hot tears pouring down her face. In the midst of all the confusion, she didn’t know what to think. Anger was human nature, and had to have a place somewhere.

The most obvious target was herself, but she shunned the notion away for a more acceptable frontage.

Spike had a soul.

With as much as the truth had pounded her mind already in the past hour, she couldn’t force herself beyond realization. Spike had a soul. Spike had willingly gone out and won his soul. A prize. The trophy signifying the end of long trials.

He had won a soul for her.

There was no doubt in her mind that it was Spike’s intention to return after he collected his bounty. He had told Clem as much before his departure. Never had he calculated the possibility that subsequent guilt would consume him so thoroughly. It had been three years, closer to four, and he still was not ready.

He had sacrificed everything for her, but could not predict the consequences of his actions.

And Buffy couldn’t stop crying.

It was an angry fist that pounded relentlessly on Giles’s motel door. Scarred eyes met a wordless gaze, and without vocal confirmation, he understood.

“You know,” he observed reverently. She couldn’t tell if shock or relief coursed through his tone, and at that minute, it didn’t matter. “You…”

“I know,” she acknowledged, tenor cold. She knew she was misplaced in her anger, but it pumped through her, filling lungs with air and veins with blood. “God, how could you not tell me?”

The Watcher sighed, motioning her inward with a jest of his head. Buffy followed grudgingly, duster tight against her body. It wasn’t until she heard the door close behind her that she turned around. Awkward silence filled mindless gaps as he brushed passed her to shut off the television, set to the news, of course, as only Giles would. He pulled out a chair beside the heat vent and offered her a seat.

“Things are going to get difficult for you,” he acknowledged wearily. “And perhaps I could have stopped that, had I mentioned something. But that wasn’t the way he wanted it, and I had to respect his desires. After all, I dragged him along, and despite all the trouble it’s seemed to have caused, I am glad I did. There are things he’s seen that would have taken me a while to pick up on. You saw him earlier today in the Magic Box.” A sigh rolled off his shoulders. “The William you met tonight is a far cry from the William I took in those years ago. He wasn’t a mess, but he wasn’t as collected as he is now. The slightest reference had the ability to send him down the path of sacrament. He cries at ease, now, usually when forgiveness is mentioned or implied, but in retrospect, he has progressed admirably.” Giles looked down, studying his clasped hands. “He believed up until our arrival that you hated him, and he was…well, not content, but satisfied. To him, it was poetic justice. He could deal with it, even if it ate him up. It killed him to know he was the source of your suffering, but he accepted that it was right that way. He never wanted you to stop hating him. You have seen him…what did you say?”

The Watcher’s words worked like ice through her heated bloodstream, and by the time he stopped speaking, she was rendered no more enlightened than she had felt upon leaving the graveyard. A heavier burden of guilt was weighing forth. “I…” The Slayer looked down, the mask of anger fading away, beset with reluctant understanding. “I didn’t know, and I had to…I realized that I…and I had to tell him…”

“Buffy.” Attentively, Giles leaned forward, eyes dangerously wide. “Do you love him?”

“I did,” she whispered, looking down at last. “I loved Spike, I mean. Don’t look so horrified. Took me a while to realize, and even longer to accept. I didn’t fully understand until tonight. Until I realized how much…” Her voice trailed off with a heavy breath. “I told him, and—”

“You told him?” He paled with concern. “Oh God. How is he?”

The way those two understood each other was uncanny. Buffy shook her head in amazement. “He broke down. Then he started yelling at me. About how I couldn’t love something like him, because of what he had tried to do. And I told him I had forgiven him…then I saw.”

“You told him you loved him before you knew?”

Buffy pursed her lips. She couldn’t find a will within herself to look at the Watcher. The spot on the far wall suddenly became the epitome of fascination. “Like I said, I’m a sick, horrible thing that loved a monster. But sweet Jesus, I don’t care anymore. You saw what he did. He did it for me, Giles. Spike—not William…he did it for me. And that’s worth everything. And now…” Tears clouded her eyes, squeezing passed sealing barriers before she could stop them. “And now I don’t know who he is.”

A small, understanding smile spread nether the Watcher’s lips, and he stood, nearing to give her shoulder a reassuring pat. “Take it from me…picture Spike as you knew him. Add an immeasurable conscience, thoughtfulness, and a sense of poetic appreciation, and you have William. Sometimes the similarities between my colleague and the demon are so…precise that…”

“But I don’t know what to think anymore!” Buffy cried, leaning into what comfort her former Watcher had to offer. “How could he do that? How could he ask for his soul? It’s impossible, Giles! You and I both know that’s—”

“Oh yes. I knew so bloody much at the time that I could not help but hurt him with my opinion. Even after we were working together, I doubted the sincerity of his motivation. It wasn’t the big things, understand. Every time he let his guard down, he unconsciously let me see a part of himself. I first saw him as William, oh, likely the night he told me that he refused to let himself grow too comfortable sleeping on my couch, eating my food, and so forth. He noted a desire to have legal means to obtain his blood and Weetabix. He never wanted me to forgive him or consider him a friend.” Giles shook his head in lingering awe. Even after so many years, it could take him aback. “The trouble is, you can’t know William and not crave his friendship. I don’t see him as a demon anymore, Buffy. Whatever suffering he puts himself through—lest it concerns you—he keeps concealed. He’s the most helpful worker I’ve had, and his passion for books rivals my own. Spike gave William to the world because he thought it would make you happy. It was perhaps the only selfless thing he ever did. He…he truly loved you. William loves you, too. It’s hard to know where he ends and Spike begins. They are so…alike.”

An odd sense of revered complacency commanded her features, and her gaze traveled dazedly from the wall to the floor. “He sounds wonderful,” she whispered, closing her eyes tightly and shaking her head. “God! What kind of person would miss a demon, Giles? I’m the goddamned Slayer! And I can’t help—”

“I would have agreed with you, once upon a time,” he acknowledged. “But my understanding of this situation is much more extensive than our ordeal with Angelus all those years ago.” When she challenged him with her eyes, he sighed with exasperation and rose to his feet, instinctively modifying conduct into instructor mode. “Spike’s desire for a soul inadvertently gave him one. Not literally, of course—that didn’t come until later. But when he saw that it would please you, his ability to fight his demon and crave the change…I believe that gave him a figurative spirit. His genuine want of goodness and love for you overpowered the darker nature of his origin. He did not understand it then, and while he struggled with his instincts, he learned to control them.” Giles captured any straying conviction with a significant intake of breath. “He loved you, demon and man, where no vampire, not even Angel, could dare to touch you. What happened that night in your bathroom—” She winced. “—I believe was a reflection of the demon in face of rejection. Of trying so hard without reaping the benefit of altered consequence. Did you love him then?”

Buffy sighed and looked down. “I told him that I could never trust him enough for that. That night, I mean. That’s what I said before…but Angel reminded me of something tonight. I loved him before I trusted him.” Unbelievingly. She shook her head. “’Course, I was sixteen and had only died once. That seems so long ago.”

“Just a few years.” Giles smiled. “Did you, though?”

“Love Spike? Yeah. I did. He knew it, least it seemed like he did. Kept telling me I did, even when I insisted it wasn’t possible. I think…no, that is why I pushed him away. I knew then, on some level…I had to. And it terrified me. How could I love a killer? What kind of monster was I?” Buffy’s tears came easily now, flowing freely down her cheeks with no sense of reserve. “So he’s suffering now because of me. Because I was too prejudiced to see him for what he was when he—”

“You couldn’t have known better. I wouldn’t have, then. He has what he wanted. What he believed you deserved.”

“An eternity of torment? How could he want that?”

“Because of the wrong he committed you.” The Watcher smiled softly, sighing with dry realization. “Perhaps I was wrong, and I never should have brought him. Well, I suppose that’s a bit rash; his assistance thus far has been more than sufficient. But I don’t believe he is doing either of you any good. I shudder to think how much we will have retracted in progress when we finally return to London. He’s here because he loves you. Did he tell you that?”

“Not in so many words, but I can see. His eyes—”

“Yes. Likely, with your admission, he will refrain from pronouncing his affections verbally.” Giles sighed. “It would only make things harder for you.”

She stifled a sob. “Things are already hard. I just wish I could do something. Everything I do that I think will make things better just…hurts him more.”

“At least he knows,” he replied softly. “And after time, knowing such will help him heal.”

The storm finally began to wither, her aching insides reaching some point of acceptable calm. Buffy sighed and looked down. She felt she had drained herself dry of tears, and the mere notion caused her eyes to well up again. No more would be shed tonight. The evening had had its share.

“It hurts,” she whispered.

“Yes,” Giles agreed. “But it won’t forever. William will likely distance himself from you. But be assured he loves you very much. He wouldn’t pain himself like this if he didn’t.”

Buffy nodded, trembling. “I’m not sure if that makes things better,” she murmured. “Or worse.”

Everyone had assembled at the Magic Box for what would be one of the last communal meetings. Until the Master went public, Giles ventured it was best to refrain from community property and stick to places that required an invitation. He was alone when he arrived that evening. Willow was at the register, helping Dawn prepare for upcoming finals. Angel and Buffy were sparring in the back rooms—an occasional grunt or two emanating to the entry. Xander had buried himself in books, arriving somewhat fatigued from a long night. After William’s departure the previous evening, Dawn had dragged him to the Bronze where he disappeared for two hours, returning with a dazed, half-goofy smile on his face. Conspicuously, the lead singer of the Annoying Pedestrians was also absent during that interval.

They all had their various ways of dealing with apprehension.

The sun had set an hour and a half before William finally arrived. Buffy, pumped from her workout, felt a familiar twinge cripple her insides and knew before he entered that he was near. There wasn’t a doubt in her mind that he suffered the same insight. After their sorrowful exchange, it would be difficult to look at him. To know and not speak.

To know and not implore his forgiveness for forcing him to such desperate measures.

Buffy understood why she had revoked blame for so many years. Irrefutably, guilt was one nasty bitch.

However, when he pushed through the doors, nothing remained of the man she had left the night before. Instead, he carried the visage of the utmost concentration, confident in stride even if his eyes told her otherwise. For the briefest instant, she marveled at how different he looked without his coat before consciously digging her nails into the leather that surrounded her.

“Nice of you to join us,” Xander quipped, not looking up. “Especially—”

“Sod off, Harris, I want to get a few things straight.” Attention immediately captivated by everyone in the room. Angel slowed by her side, handing her a diet soda, even as her eyes refused to leave the bleached vampire at the front of the store. No one made a sound. “I prolly should ‘ave started with this yesterday, but I’d like to get it out of the way so we don’t folly around and waste valuable time with little nasties. Can’t afford any more distractions. In order: yes, I am back in town. Yes, I have been workin’ with Ripper since I left. And yes, I did snatch myself a soul before I got to London. All’s the well, then. Back to work, people.”

No one moved for a full minute.

“And to that I add a ‘huh’?” Xander finally said. “You got a what?”

Buffy drew in a breath and held it, popping open her soda and taking a long, hard swig. The astonishment beaming from her sister and her friend was singular for their lasting unawareness. They were the only two left out of the loop. It was for show, she understood. Certain factors had the means to get in the way of more important things. If they didn’t come out with William’s altered persona, he would be gone before everyone had the chance to catch up.

Hostility was not needed here, and while the announcement likely wouldn’t clear away all diversion, it was nice to come clean.

No more secrets.

The vampire turned to Xander and arched a sardonic brow. “A nice sparkly surprise. You know. Like what Peaches has, only a bit more poetic. That’s all I ‘ave to say. Chop, chop. Time’s a wastin’.”

“No!” Dawn cried, pacing steps forward. “You can’t just come in here and say that and…and expect us to go ‘Oh, all right’ and get back to work. How did you do it? Where did you get it? Was—”

“Firstly, Nibblet, I don’t expect you to do anything. I didn’t say it so you’d forgive me. Rather you not. Go ‘head and wallop me a few times; won’t make a bit of bloody difference. Gimme all I deserve.” A sad smile tickled his lips, and Buffy watched her sister’s face contort with grief-stricken realization. When she didn’t move, William heaved a sigh and shook his head. “I got it in Africa. Went there right after…” Unbidden his eyes rose and finally met hers, flashes of lightning waving behind stormy pupils—a sea of inward torment and forbidden adoration. A thousand apologies screaming an empty plight to the night that didn’t want to hear. “Went there right after I left town. Beat me a few baddies and got this as a prize. So you can all get off Ripper’s case for workin’ with somethin’ to the likes of me.” He spoke broadly as though the announcement was directed to everyone. “He didn’t take me in outta the kindness of his heart.”

“Well—” Giles began to protest.

“Least not until he saw that I wasn’t…that I’m not…” William trailed off in exasperation, body frame hung with tension. The room fell still until he moved, chuckling humorlessly as Willow came to his side, hand instinctively drawn to his shoulder. “You know,” he said, turning to Xander. “I’ve had this bloody conversation three times already since I got here. Have the entire speech memorized, and I just realized I don’t give a good damn what you think. Wasted more time trying to cover my tracks from the bloodhounds that we coulda used to research this apocalypse. You want the full story? Ask Peaches, or Red ‘ere, or Buffy.” His eyes were drawn home again. “I jus’ don’t ‘ave it in me right now.”

Sharply, both Dawn and Xander spun on their heels to glare at the Slayer. “You knew?” they demanded simultaneously.

“Only since last night,” she replied defensively. “And hey! Why yelly at the Buffy? Both Willow and Angel—”

“Enough!” The vampire at her side came forward, shaken with irritation. “There’s no point in arguing about it now. Spike told everyone for a reason, and we need to respect that. For the moment, we have bigger problems to deal with. Everyone can be angry with everyone when I’m gone and out of danger of a massive headache.” Angel shook his head and turned away, selecting a random book off the shelf and flipping open the cover.

“Thanks, Peaches,” William muttered, though it was obvious the words came with difficulty. After an uncomfortably long pause, he cleared his throat and moved toward Giles, selecting a book off the shelf beside him. “I was thinkin’ last night,” he said, speaking casually as though the previous conversation hadn’t existed. “This Master bloke’s got a real yen to hurt you.” He commanded Buffy’s gaze with his. “I’m thinkin’ there might be a stronger link between him and the chap you killed. Can’t say for certain, but I’d be prepared fo’ anything. He might attack your mind, even hold memories passed on from—”

The Watcher stepped forward sharply. “You’re not suggesting reincarnation, are you?”

William shook his head. “No. Nothin’ like that. I’m sayin’ he’ll feed off his rage. The more brassed he is, the stronger he’ll be. And his followers will revere him like a bloody god.”

“A vampiric Buddha,” Angel offered unhelpfully.

“More like little Buddha goes ballistic,” the other vampire quipped, arousing a snort of amusement from Giles, and they shared a few seconds of isolated laughter before understanding their humor had escaped impressionable minds. The reaction was almost simultaneous: they looked down, coughed, murmured something intelligible, and shuffled on with work.

To Willow, Xander tentatively whispered, “Are we sure they’re not related?”

And this was how they worked, Buffy realized. This was an image of how life carried through in London.

“My point is,” William continued, flexing his shoulders as if to reaffirm his composure, “that I think this bloke’ll ‘ave anticipated every bloody precaution we’re taking. He’s not the same fellow, of course, but he’ll ‘ave a sense about your style. He’ll attack where he knows it hurts the most.

“How would he know?” the Slayer whispered.

“I’m guessin’ by these vamps that bleed blackness. Strong number growin’ by the minute. He’s bein’ careful—trying nothing impulsive.” For the life of him, William looked like he should have a pair of glasses in the heart of mid-lecture polishing. If he noticed her unbelieving scrutiny, he did not make it known. “Whatever vamps you’ve killed ‘ave been expendable. Like martyrs helpin’ the cause. Your tinglies don’t go away, do they?” She blinked, realized he had addressed her, and shook her head. “Didn’t think so. Yeah. Been watchin’ you, they ‘ave. ‘S not even safe to patrol anymore.” With a sudden burrow of fury, the vampire growled and kicked a nearby trashcan in wan frustration. Several concerned glances were shot toward the Watcher in anticipation of a violent outbreak, but he knowingly shook his head in promise that the spat was minor, and his companion was nowhere near losing control.

William noticed and rolled his eyes, obviously restraining himself from tapping his chest in reminder of his earlier announcement. Instead he shook his head and continued. “I’d lay low—find a safe place. Chances are your house’s monitored, and even if they aren’t allowed across the threshold, there’ll be a loophole. They’ll find it.”

“But they can’t—” Dawn stuttered.

“I bloody well know they can’t. What I’m sayin’ is there’ll be things they can do to get you outside. Might be during the daylight. Me and Peaches aren’t the only vamps that can lurk in the shadows and wait for you to come to us.” He took a minute to indulge in a proud smirk—a true visage of the demon that had harvested his body for over a century. Buffy suppressed a slight shiver. “I’d recommend stayin’ somewhere you don’t go often.”

“We can use my parents’ basement,” Xander volunteered, then flinched. “Again. They should be used to me being such a low-life. Though it’s most likely storage down there, now.”

“It’ll do,” Buffy agreed. “But I don’t think I should stop patrolling. I mean— that’s kind of excessive. There’s lots of innocent people out there who—”

William’s eyes blazed with concern, mouth dropping open in protest. However, it was Angel who stepped forward first, placing a hand on her shoulder in silent verification. “We should patrol,” he agreed, glancing up and catching the other vampire’s eyes. “All of us. It’s not safe for the others, but we could handle—”

A grunt of disbelieving laughter escaped the bleached blonde, his eyes going wide with incredulity. “There’s a bloody party I’d hate to crash. No. Sorry, Peaches. I’m not going to put up with—”

“Spike,” the Slayer intervened softly, stepping forward and symbolically out of Angel’s reach. She placed a hand delicately on his forearm, eyes wide and beseeching. The wave of softness that coursed in affect was impossible to miss. “Please?”

That was it, and everyone knew it. Thick tension pierced the air—surprising that it could remain so heavy with everything that had occurred. Torn conflict and swelling adoration filled William’s eyes, and with a quaking sigh, he looked down and nodded. “All right,” he conceded, nodding tightly. “All right.”

A smile flickered across her lips—sad but content. Her hand traveled down his arm to grasp his, giving him a reassuring squeeze. The touch was fiery cold, painful to both but similarly impossible to retract. They were both so starved for contact, even if it hurt.

The room remained speculatively silent with the exchange—respectful if not confused. Neither moved until Angel stalked passed them, pushing through the shop doors. At that, they redefined the space between them, though not by much, and followed without another word.

“Why do I have the feeling,” Xander muttered, “that we missed something big?”

No one replied. Dawn was staring at the door, as though expecting something else to happen of measurable significance. “Look what he did for her,” she whispered, awe-struck. “I can’t believe him. I can’t believe me. I was so awful to him the other night.”

“As you should have been,” Harris affirmed with a stern nod. “For all you knew—”

“Hey!” Willow growled, prowling forward. “Lay off! Sure, Spike did a terrible thing. So did I, if you guys remember. He also did something remarkable because he felt so bad. I—”
“We’re talking about Spike here,” he retorted. “Remember. ‘Ooh, I’m an evil demon, who—’”

The Witch rolled her eyes and shook her head. “Don’t be a butt, Xan.”

“Well, how’d he do it? Must’ve done something—”

“Fact of the matter is,” Giles said softly—twitching his irritation and discomfort. “Whatever he is right now is what counts. Will is a colleague and a friend who loves her very much. I trust him with my life and hers. And as much as you would like to believe otherwise, Spike gave William to the world out of his guilt. He sacrificed himself.” Pausing fondly, the Watcher gazed out the window, eyes falling down the street where the unlikely trio had vanished. “Wish I could thank him.”

Next