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Prologue
"Angel, I wasn't expecting a call from you so soon."
"I found her body."
Bishop's face fell. It was undeniable now. "Are you all right?" Was he all right? His charge was dead.
"I don't know," Angel answered truthfully.
"What did you do with the body?"
"It's in the guest room."
"Angel! You didn't --"
He shook his head. "She's been turned Bishop. She's a vampire."
The Watcher paled visibly.
~~~
She was sitting on the fire escape outside her bedroom again. The wind picked up her long candy-purple hair and blew it into her face. Angel was glad. He didn't have to worry she might catch him starring again.
The City of Angels was clouded over today. Sunshine didn't stop his -- his what? What were they? Where they still married? Were there rules that governed this kind of thing? her from going out. It hadn't occurred to him to divest her of the bespelled lapis cuff. She certainly hadn't given it up.
He remembered when she came home with the long purple tresses. As he opened his mouth to yell at her for the sixth time in that short week she spoke. "What Angel? What do you have to say to me? First you tell me that I am not your wife and that I'm not allowed near any of her things or your things or anything at all in this house. But what, I can't change the way I look, I have to be the living memory of . . . of," her lips curled into a sneer of disgust.
"You say I'm not her but you want me to look like her. Who's in denial Angel? I'm not trying to be anything more than what I am. Deal!"
She'd stormed off into her room, just off the living room, and slammed the door. Angel was left dumbfounded and ashamed. Every word she'd said was true. He denied her what was rightfully hers for the sake of his own sanity yet would not let her be who and what she was.
Angel watched her sitting on the fire escape, pale beige throw blanket wrapped about her shoulder. It was for their unborn child he knew, she certainly didn't need it. Once she'd caught him. She merely sighed as if more tired and bored than imaginable and looked away. It was just that he didn't know what to make of her anymore. She wasn't the woman he knew yet he had the same feelings for her.
That corner of the fire escape had become her favorite place to sit over the past month -- that and sun room. The sun room was their green house. Angel remembered her planting night blooming flowers so it could be theirs. Vivid earth-tone ground growing sunflowers, headily scented hyacinths, trailing honeysuckle and the requisite rose -- peach not red -- were part of her garden. Night blooming jasmine, conundrums and chrysanthemums, which opened late and closed early in the morning, scented his garden. Now it had become hers.
The first month of her . . . stay had been trying at best. They fought daily.
Christina laughed and it too called him. "Ah, poor Angel."
Holding one of the bags up she made a show of looking first at it then at him. "Hmm, where does it look like it came from?"
"I mean," he took two short strides to reach her, "how did you get it?" His voice seethed thinly veiled anger.
Christina only laughed. "How do you think I got it?"
Angrily he brushed the bags from her hands. Pulling her up by her collar Angel shook her, "Who did you kill to get these?" he ground out.
Her human mask fell away. "Who do you think I am?!" she roared and pushed him away. "I killed no one this afternoon," Christina's childish human features returned, "not yet." "I've had no victims since seeking shelter here, it was part of the promise. I won't go back on my word, especially not to you." She stood there full of righteous indignation, fire flashing in her eyes. Still angry herself she grabbed up the spilled bags and stormed into her room.
Inside Christina didn't know if she wanted to laugh or cry. "I think he hates me Honey. It's how it should be." She could feel its gentle heartbeat in place of her own, a semblance of its thoughts in her head. And though she didn't know its sex -- in life she'd prayed for a girl -- she loved it more than unlife itself. It was the only thing that was still sane. She was a vampire but not; she was a Slayer but not; she was married but not and somewhere along the way she was sure was going to lose her undead mind.
Fire shot through her veins. Taking a deep breath Christina steeled herself to leave her room, to enter his domain.
She walked out, ignoring Angel, straight into the kitchen. Opening the fridge she pulled out a blood bag. Though it tasted better warm, she let the mask slide and sank her fangs into the bag. Her very skin crawled with need. It overrode the feeling of the child inside her. She'd gone too long without feeding. Clutching the bag she drank in long heavy draughts.
Angel walked in on her and, disgusted, turned away. She only laughed around the bag. Throwing it down she reached for another and collapsed. Pain laced through her abdomen. A scream tore, involuntarily, from her throat. Angel raced back into the kitchen.
Looking down at her doubled over form, he took in her red lips and the near empty blood bag. Christina looked up at him, pleading with her eyes. "You drank too fast," he sneered. With yellow eyes flashing and ridges standing forth, he could find no sympathy and walked away.
This time she did cry, blood tears licked away on their travels to the floor.
Christina danced in a slow tight circle. Hips moving in a counter rhythm, Angel watched entranced, as her arms gracefully rose above her head, weaving invisible patterns in the air. He knew this song. It was at the bridge, a strange mix of mood and techno music.
My lover's gone
his boots no longer by my door.
He left at dawn
and as I slept I felt go.
My lover's gone,
I will not watch the ocean.
My lover's gone,
no earthly ship will ever bring
him home again.....
Bring him home again.
He stared, entranced as her game face slid on and off, like a masque. She swung away from him, long hair flying about her face. As her arms kept a rhythm of their own, her fingers wove a spell into the air, one that, had she been looking at him, would have trapped Angel forever.
Angel paced back and forth behind her. Relaxed on the couch, she laid her head back allowing the sticky sweet juice to dribble down her chin, watching him. "And how do you know that?"
She laughed. Angel could feel the answering pull. "We've had this discussion before Sire --"
"Don't call me that."
"It's what you are. Although, in human terms, I guess I'd be your great grand-childe now wouldn't I?" Her voice was low and melodic, sweet as the fruit she needlessly ate. "Never heard of a human Sire before but, then again, whoever heard of a souled vampire?" She turned, resting one arm on the back of the sofa and said, "You've always been mixed up, haven't you Angelus."
"Don't call me that either," he said exasperated.
"Oh, and what should I call you? Liam? If I were you, and thank God I'm not, that would offend me even more." Angel glared daggers at her. Her answering laughter rang throughout the quite house. "All right, all right, if it makes you feel better -- Angel then. But only while my good mood lasts.
"But, like I was saying: you wouldn't dare give me my soul back. You don't really want me to feel lower than mudo crudoff do you? Because," she stood in one graceful move, "that's exactly what it would be." She rounded the couch and faced him. "You suffered for the wrong you did for hundreds of years. Do you know what it would be for me? Do you know where my soul is now? Were you a faithful little Catholic Liam?" She reached out and stroked his face, he quickly brushed it away.
"No, you weren't, were you? But, you know what, your wife believed all that mudo crudoff she learned in church. Do you know where this body's soul is now? It is in Heaven in the bosom of God," smiled cockily at him.
Angel opened his mouth but she cut him off. "Yes dimwit, it's with God. Was that where your soul was residing before it was stuck back in your wretched body? I'd bet not. Is that where it'll go when you do the world and me a favor and die? I'd still win that bet. But she was better stuff. She was all faith and hope and religious belief.
"And she was a Slayer. Can you imagine the soul of a Slayer coming back into its new vampire body?" Her voice whisper soft, they stood close, Angel entranced by the quiet fervency of her words. "Are you really that selfish, because then you don't deserve whatever gift it is you think The So-Called Powers have given you."
"And how," the words stuck in his throat, "why, why should I believe you? There is no Hell."
Christina smiled patronizingly, "There is a Hell. You were there half a millennium --"
"Wolfram & Hart, they showed me --"
"Your faith is weak. Your soul is weak. That woman, Kat, Catherine, whatever her name was, she tried to explain it to you but you didn't want to believe. When this body dies I'm going to Hell. I'm a demon in a Slayer's body, and yet I realize that. But go ahead," her voice caressed him, "take me from my eternal reward. ."
Chocolate pools met near black depths . . . depths that taunted and teased and shimmered gold. "I. . .don't. . .believe. . .you," Angel ground out.
He watched as ridges pressed forward and deep brown eyes were become yellow and alien. "YOU DON'T BELIEVE! FINE! See if your precious souled wife doesn't WALK INTO THE SUN. I'll be laughing from inside my cage while you watch her!" A deep growl rumbled from her chest. Christina'd taken a step back from the force of her own anger. "Whatever I frelling saw in you I Don't Know."
Turning on her heel Christina walked out into the now dark sun room.
Angel almost didn't recognize her. It had been a long day at the office. They all seemed to be long days lately. This particular case . . .he was set to let Gunn and his granddaughter handle it but that would mean coming home earlier. He couldn't bear to be home anymore. She was there ready to mock him, tease him, seduce him.
It was equally hard leaving her. With that cuff on she was free to go where she pleased, only the threat of her Sire kept her in line. Angel wasn't sure it would work for very long.
She lay on the couch arm dangling over the side. He didn't see her until he sneezed.
"Kezuntite." Angel turned. The kitchen island and the couch were at right angles. He could only see her small bare feet. "You're coming down with something," she stated matter-of-factly.
"Maybe," he answered in a noncommittal way. Can't show any weakness, he thought.
"You are," she sounded tired. "Have some tea. It'll make you feel better even if it doesn't do anything."
Angel leaned against the countertop and crossed his arms over chest. "And why do you care?"
"Does it matter?" she asked, arching up in an almost unnatural position so as to see him over the sofa arm. Her long purple hair was once again black-brown. . .with electric blue streaks.
Though loath to admit it, it looked good on her.
When he came out again, Angel dressed for comfort and another long night of sparring with the house inmate, she was gone. Sometimes he wondered why he simply didn't hibernate in his bedroom, sometimes -- only sometimes -- she did. Because you can't bear to be away from her either. Passing the kitchen on his way into the living room Angel noticed the boiling tea kettle. She wouldn't admit it, but he knew she'd put it on for him.
Angel looked from it to the couch where her feet had resided. Accepting the token for what it was, a rare gift, he made himself a cup of tea with honey. Setting it on the low coffee table near the sofa, he took her place on the couch.
The soft slap of feet on the kitchen's hardware floor signaled her return.
"Thank you."
"What for?" she asked, hardly looking at him though she knew, she had to, Angel was there. Neither could see the other without turning.
"Nothing, nothing." It seemed, maybe, maybe, tonight would be a quiet one. It did until she sat on the carpeted floor beside him. He would ignore her, there had been many nights when it was his only solace.
It was like dreaming, one Angel used to have in another life about another woman. He had to be asleep, the soft sound of her voice invaded his dream. There was no cutting edge to sibilant sound, no double entendre behind the words and no quiet mockery hidden in musical intonation. Words like that didn't exist in the mouth of the woman he knew, they lived in those of the dream -- one close and out of reach.
It was a remembered act of devotion, one he would have never countenanced in that other life.
He would move, she didn't have to sit on the floor.
No, it was all right. He didn't have to move on her account, she was comfortable where she was.
But he didn't want her sitting at his feet. There were other chairs . . .
She didn't want to sit in another chair and she wasn't sitting at his feet, she sat at his shoulder. If he gave her long enough she'd lay down too, if he'd hand her a cushion.
"My mother, your grandmother, once said that hard things are good for a bad back," she said lowly. "There isn't anything much harder than the floor I guess," she smiled to herself, "except maybe my hardwood floor.
"My floor," she mused. "The only thing I own now is the floor my feet tread, the air I breath for you . . .you in my belly." Angel couldn't be sure if he was awake or not, if he heard or dreamed. "Your heartbeat is mine," she whispered, "I hear it in my bones." Her voice, though quiet, became excited, "When you get older, love, you have to take an earphone and bite it. I know it sounds silly but when you do you'll hear everything with your teeth. It's funny and fun -- and I won't be there to watch. Or show you or see you or . . .
"Did you know, Honey, I used to do this a long time ago in another life when I was another person.
"Do you love me Honey?" She laughed. "That was a stupid question. I'm just talking now. I was silent all day, aren't you proud of me?" Miming a Yorkshire accent, she said, "I been a good gel I 'ave. I swear it Mum.
"I wonder," she dropped the accent, "what they've told my mother. I haven't seen her in years and years and years. Mmm, to go home again. I'd love to take you to New York, Honey love, where the leaves turn all kind of colors. Beautiful, beautiful colors. I'm sure you'd fall in love with one of them. It's like fire and sun.
"You know, there's a song called 'baby Love'. I can't remember who it's by. It was cute. I'm in baby love," she sang part of the chorus, "I'm in baby love again. Someone gave the MP3 to me. Can't remember who. There was another one too, a song, it was, it was. . .hmm, how'd it go?
"Try to lose the negative but all I lose is time. That's not right. It was, Faced with a challenge . . . of finding right and wrong . . . in a brand new world that recognizes none," she sang softly in the soft light. "It's hard for me to believe . . . you know my travels. . . I'm the only one, the only one -- usin' food for thought and thought for food. All I have's my attitude, the hourglass, my ever changin' moods. Usin' food for thought and thought for food, all I have's my attitude, the hourglass, my ever changing moods.
"Faced with a challenge . . . of doing all the novel talk . . . Wonderin' how to pay for the things my mouth has bought. Wantin' to say the right things . . .whenever I talk . . .I change the way stood and the way I walked. Usin' food for thought and thought for food, all I have's my attitude, the hourglass, my ever changin' moods. Usin' food for thought and thought food, all I have's my ever changin' moods, the hour glass, my ever changin' attitude. I don't remember anymore."
She chuckled lowly, "But I remember . . .other things," she smiled to herself and, unthinking, took Angel's dangling hand in her own. Hers were surprisingly warm. "What you ask . . .or don't ask. . .I remember doing this for friends. They'd put their hands in mine," she pressed his fingertips to her lips, "or I'd take it from them and make them into putty. It's nice being useful to someone sometimes." Her hands kneaded and pressed into Angel's. "I haven't been useful in a long time."
"You're Mommy's a corpse, Honey," she whispered too low for the mortal beside her to hear.
Releasing him she rubbed her forehead with the back of her hand. "It's funny, Honey love," she whispered, "but I'm tired. I didn't think vampires got tired," she smiled once again, "but what do I know of vampires?" Rising slowly, carefully, she kneeled over Angel's prone body, picking up his hand again. " 'Alas, poor Yorick. I knew him Horatio.' I knew him a long time ago Honey. I loved him then too." She kissed his hand then, holding it to her unbeating heart, gently pressed her surprisingly warm lips to Angel's -- only to be surprised when strong arms circle her waist and soft lips press firmly against her own;
("I only want to feel something Bishop."
("You aren't the person we knew anymore."
("You think I don't know that? I know that better than anyone else.")
surprised when those strong arms pull her closer to the rising chest, the beating heart and hot skin;
("I've never needed to touch someone more in my entire life. No one wants to touch me anymore."
("What do you want me to say?"
("You're supposed to be my Watcher. You won't even touch me. What am I supposed to do?"
("You're a corpse. Learn to live with the disappointment.")
surprised when the hand she holds looses from her grasp and works itself under her shirt; surprised when the living body beneath her sits up, keeping hold of both her undead one and the kiss they share, and walks her into the place from which she was forbidden only one short month before;
(You look at the man you've trusted in all aspects of your life and wonder which of you has truly become alien.)
surprised when she feels the ever familiar bed and its deep sapphire blue bed coverings beneath her back;
("Well, thank you. Finally someone not afraid to frelling tell me, tell me. . . t-to, to tell me . . ." and you watch yourself, unable to speak the words while looking into this man's face, break connection.)
unsurprised when she kisses the unforgiving lips back, strips the warm body of its shirt, plunders the mouth looking for a taste she had been sure existed only in some deluded part of her own mind; unsurprised when she moans a forbidden name into the warm wet cavern as her own hands explore a forgotten topography of skin, muscle and bone; unsurprised when the staccato of a heartbeat joins the one she only recently learned to hear;
(Touching your face you feel your "true" image emerge. It doesn't seem any more real than the "mask" you know so well.)
surprised when a familiar yet sharp pain moves through her belly; surprised when spiced chocolate pools meet her own near-black ones in wonder and fear and, ultimately, realization; unsurprised as her body is shocked with cool air as the living vacate the dead.
Angel ran a hand through his mussed hair trying to come to terms with what he'd done. . . what he'd nearly done . . .what he'd wanted to do. Looking out a corner window LA was spread before him, all glitter and false promise. His own haggard reflection stared back at him as did the rumpled bed behind him. Empty, it stared at him accusingly strewn with clothes: his and hers. Yet from the corner of his eye he saw she lay there still, silent and wide eyed as if in shock.
"Get out," he rasped.
Looking at the reflection in the mirror her disembodied voice floated to him, "You're upset because I'm not her."
"Get out," he repeated.
"You're right. I'm not her," she went on as if he had not spoken. "And it's good too, because she was weak."
"Shut up."
"She was weak and small and --"
"Shut up!"
" -- and stupid. I'm none of those things. You can't mold me. You can't dominate me. You can't put me in the palm of your hand and crush me. 'Bend me, break me any way you need me, all I want is you.' That was her, not me and you can't handle me."
"Out," he ground out, anger and pain and outrage braided into the word.
Slowly she rose and grabbed the nearest article of clothing. It was his shirt she nearly put on but, smelling its wrongness he supposed, discarded. With a quiet efficiency -- and blank eyes Angel couldn't see -- she pulled on her shirt, gathered her things and left the room that had been theirs.
In her own room she dropped the carefully collected things on the floor. She'd pick them up tomorrow, maybe. Grabbing the throw blanket -- it was probably cold outside -- she lifted the window and climbed onto the fire escape.
"Well, I think I did it Honey. It wasn't how I intended but he hates me now. I'm sure of it. That's a good thing right? I mean, that's what I was trying to do, so it's a good thing.
"I wish you were here to tell me it's a good thing." She sat in her favorite corner, across from the stairs, feeling the wind blowing her black-brown and blue hair in her face. " '. . .all I have's my attitude, the hourglass, my ever changin mood,' Honey," she quoted. "It's all I have."
Looking up at the fading stars she said, "I think it's time visit Daddy, Honey love. I've put it off long enough.
" 'Faced with a challenge,'" she said in a whisper, " 'of knowing right from wrong, having no preference or allegiance to either one . . .'"
"How the bloody hell did you get in here?!"
Christina shrugged. "Does it matter, Sire?"
Spike was up and across the room with her neck in his hands before she could blink. "It does if I decide to snap your pretty neck." Suddenly, his hand was on her gently swelling stomach, "Or I could pull the whelp out of your soddin' belly and have it for my midday snack. Why wait till nightfall when lunch comes gift wrapped?"
"You could, Sire," Christina managed to croak, "but I thought you'd want to hear me out first."
"Who says I can't do both?"
"No one, Sire --"
"Though I must say I rather enjoy the subservient bit." He released her, Christina crashing to the floor. "So what brings my bleeding wayward childe home?" He lit a cigarette, "Never thought I'd say that," and muttered.
"A vampiress scorned, Sire, is a very dangerous thing."
"No."
"Then come out." She stood in the doorway watching as he lay on his stomach, fever flushing his skin. "Let me help you Angel." When he didn't answer she sat in the living room. She was too tired to argue with a sick man. The closer she got to delivery the less well Christina felt too.
She heard the soft slap of his feet as he left the safety of the bedroom, passed through the kitchen and into the living room. There was a weariness in his step.
A feeling of solitude enveloped the room.
She straddled his back as Angel lay on the couch. "Don't worry," she said in a low voice feeling him tense beneath her. "I wouldn't hurt you. I need you." It was true and whether or not he believed her intentions. Leaning low she whispered, "Let me help you."
He needed this. Angel needed the quiet, the serenity, the darkness, the weakness. He needed to forget who they were, their history and more recent past. He needed to drop the defenses and fall into her touch.
"I just want to feel . . .safe in my own skin," she sang in a quiet, quiet voice molding the flesh beneath. Angel was only aware of her song in his head and her smooth cool legs against his fevered flesh. "I just want to feel happy again . . . Let me take off your shirt Angel."
He allowed the intimacy despite the urge to protest. ". . . I just want to be . . .deep in my own world --" Cool hands melted skin and reshaped bone. "-- but I'm so lonely I don't even want to be with myself anymore."
He was falling asleep. She was pleased. Moving to Angel's lower back she finished what she knew of the song, "Ah you're safe. Oh, oh. How's it feel? Oh, oh. And I'm so lonely I don't even want to be with myself anymore," and her act of devotion. She worked her way up his back.
For a moment she hummed the part she didn't know. "I just want to be . . .safe in my own skin. I just want to feel . . .happy again."
Finding the flesh beneath to her liking in shape and warmth she moved off him. Angel awakened as his nap and lullaby were disturbed.
"You are better now," she said quietly then turned and walked into the kitchen.
Angel was better. The peace of the extended moment, her deft hands and cooler body had done their work. He sat up looking over the back of the couch in the kitchen.
"Why?"
She understood the confusion on his face and in his question but did not answer quickly.
Standing between the bright kitchen and more serene living room, holding her mug, she said, "I'm lost Angel. I have been a vampire for a little more than a month," she said slowly as if finding the words as she spoke them. "I have no sire, no teacher. I have been human for nearly twenty seven years. My blood tells me one thing, my nature another. I have no soul yet, yet I do things like this. In less than a month I will deliver your child and, whether it's demon or human, my life is yours.
"I don't know why. I only know I am lost, I'm lost . . ."
Angel watched his wife, the Slayer turned vampire, with a haunted look walk into her room and close the door.
"So things are going well?"
He shrugged. "Best as can be expected."
Bishop's smile was weak though genuine. "If there's nothing else I'll being signing off. I'll give Willow and Oz and Tara your lo-"
"There is one thing," Angel interrupted him.
"Oh?"
He closed his eyes and took a fortifying deep breath. "It's Christina."
"The localized uninvite spell didn't work?" Bishop questioned.
"No, no, works fine. But, she's been very withdrawn lately, depressed I guess. Usually she's all venom or mocking seduction."
"And now she's not."
"Right."
Bishop pushed his glasses up his nose. "Well, it's not completely uncommon for pregnant women to go through a bout of depression. If you'd like I could --"
"Will this affect the baby?"
"Well," he answered slowly, "no but --"
"That's all I need to know. Thanks Bishop. Tell Willow, Tara and Oz hi for me," he said then broke connection before the Englishman could reply. Walking out of his study Angel headed for the kitchen and a snack. There he passed the silent and unnaturally -- for a vampire -- warm body of his wife sitting on a countertop staring at nothing as she had for the past three days.
"It will work, Sire."
"For your sake it had better."
Bishop and Angel had been out for most of the day. "You trust Christina to be by herself?" the ex-Watcher asked.
The ex-vampire shrugged. "With that cuff on I can't exactly keep her leashed. Not that I haven't tried. Besides it leaves her weakened."
"Must be difficult though, living with her day in and out. What is it now," he asked pushing up his glasses, "the beginning of a third month? You know, Angel, I could keep her for the duration of the pregnancy."
"No," Angel said with a shake of his head, "no. She's my responsibility, my obligation --"
Bishop laid a hand on his shoulder, "No, she's not. Not anymore." The man gave him a grateful look. "So, am I invited up or not?"
"Sure, if you'd like to."
"Has her depression gotten any better?"
He shrugged again. "I don't know and I don't care."
"Angel," Bishop said warningly, "this isn't like you."
"Nothing about the past three months has been like anything." Raising the elevator gate the two men stepped into the spacious warehouse apartment. "Christina?" he called. Dropping his jacket onto a chair he turned to Bishop. "Guess she's not here. You want something to drink?"
They talked. They talked like friends who hadn't seen in each other in years, more freely than Angel could ever remember talking to someone in months. It still felt like years.
His laughter reverberated around the room, "You're not serious Bishop. That happened while you were at the Watcher's Council? This is the Watcher's Council we're talking about, right?"
"Yes," was the man answering laugh. "Angel," he said, suddenly sobering, "what have you told Ms. Singletary?"
A black cloud seemed to fall over the man's features. "I don't know what to tell her. How can I explain what's happened when I feel so guilty myself?"
"Angel, you shouldn't. It's no more you're fault than mine or even hers."
"I know that. It's just . . .I took her daughter away from what would have been a normal safe --"
"You know as well as I do nothing's safe in this world."
The ex-vampire scowled. "But she didn't have to be a Slayer."
"She chose to go with you to LA. No one put a weapon to the girl's head."
There was a long pause as Angel stared into nothing, felt nothing. "I can't help it, Bishop. You have to admit a hundred years of habit is hard to stop," he commented wryly. "I want to tell her everything," he said, eyes half closed, "to tell her how strong her daughter was. I want her to know how much her daughter wanted to see her again, how much she loved her mother, how much . . ." and Angel was at a loss for words.
"There is no way I can tell Ms. Singletary that her daughter is a vampire. It would break her heart."
Bishop sighed. "I thought so too. And what of the Watchers? I've refrained from putting this in my diaries --"
"Thank you."
"-- but I feel somewhat amiss by doing so."
"It's all right, Bishop. We'll figure out something . . .I'm sure. Still haven't figured out what the official story's going to be." When the ex-Watcher gave him a confused look Angel couldn't help but laugh. "In 1746 few people noticed when someone went missing. Twenty-forty-six is an entirely different matter. In a couple of months people will start looking for her, asking about her . . .the baby. Any ideas?"
Bishop smiled grimly, "None." Glancing at his watch he said, "It's getting late."
"So it is. I guess I just haven't had this, this good a time in a very long time." Bishop gave him a skeptical look. Angel smiled despite himself. "Yes, this is the best evening I've had in a long long time," he offered his hand to the other man to shake, "Thank you."
Bishop took his hand gratefully, "You're quite welcome. Did Christina ever come in?"
Angel stood for a moment, thinking. "I don't think so. It's not like her. Course nothing's normal anymore."
"This is actually the tenth month, isn't it?"
"Yeah, why?"
"Angel, she could deliver at any moment. I know this will hardly seem appropriate but in their most primal state, vampires are very animalistic, yes?"
"Yes. Bishop, where are you--"
"Angel, it's possible she's giving birth now."
"What," the former vampire exclaimed. "Where is the mental leap coming from?"
"You said she's been depressed lately, yes?" Angel nodded. "That she hasn't gone out for days on end, yes?" He nodded again. "Doesn't it seem a little strange to you that all the sudden, after weeks of being a home body she suddenly goes out early and stays out late?"
"What does that have to do with the nature of vampires?" Angel could feel the pounding of his heart in his throat. His palms were suddenly slick and he couldn't be sure but he thought that was a hitch in his voice.
"Has Christina been . . .been staying in one place more than any other, hiding out there, um . . . Has she started taking things from her room to one particular place."
Angel's thought's raced. "She's preferred either her fire escape or --" A sharp scream pierced the relative silence --
Bishop turned. "It came from there," he said pointing to a far unused wall of the apartment.
"No," Angel touched his shoulder, "that's an echo. There's nothing over there but the back stairwell. It's coming from," he stopped. It was deathly silent again. "I think . . ." The two men stood in the quiet for several minutes, listening. They listened and listened and listened and --
Another scream pierced the air. "There! It's coming from the sun room. Come on." They ran across the expanse, Angel pushing open the heavy metal door. "Around the corner in the back is a storage room. We never used it much but that's where the echo had to come from."
They stumbled over potted plants and trailing vines. They neared the closed storage room door. "Angel, wait."
"What?!" There was another cry, louder this time.
"I have to warn you, birth is one of the most primal acts of nature and Christina may be very protective. She may not want either of us around and be quite . . .adamant about it."
"I have to go in there Bishop."
"I know. Just wanted to warn you."
Angel pushed open the dark green wood door. A wave of heat assaulted the men bringing with it the smell of sweat and blood. Eyes adjusting to the light, he swept the room spotting Christina on a pile of sheets -- they were his sheets but he didn't question that now -- in a far corner.
Both men rushed to her but stood a fair distance away. She bit down on a twisted piece of cloth, face clenched in unimaginable pain. A look of relief visibly swept over her as the contraction passed. The moment passed as the scent of the men made its way to through her own overpowering scent and the surrounding haze of pain. A rumbling growl shook her soaked frame as she swung her head back and forth trying to determine which was the hostile.
Bishop threw Angel a warning look and slowly edged toward the woman. He held his hand out to her approaching her as he would a dangerous animal. She watched him warily, sniffing the air as he neared. Suddenly her demon emerged and she snapped at him. Bishop jumped back, just grazed by her fangs.
"Well, I'm out."
"I think you're okay if you just stay back," Angel said without looking at the man. Christina watched the exchange avidly. He was slowly making his way to the mother of his child, slowly, slowly not wanting to frighten her. Without warning another contraction struck. Christina closed her eyes and threw back her head in pain. The ex-vampire rushed to her side, taking her hand. "Push," he whispered fiercely. "Push."
Bishop moved close to the couple. "Angel, you're almost --" but was cut off by the vampiress' warning growl. She couldn't keep maintain it as another contraction rushed through her. "Angel, Angel," he tried to capture the attention of the distracted man, "you're going to have to deliver the child. Christina won't let me near."
The contraction passed and both men tensed as Christina sniffed the air again. "Angel?"
"I'm here, I'm here." He smoothed her sweat darkened hair. "I'm here."
"I hate, I hate -- aaaaaahhhh!" She clenched his hand in a nearly bone-breaking grip. Her ear-piercing scream was accented by that of an infant's. The men stared at the red, misshapen wiggling thing between the vampiress' legs. Christina, still acting on instinct, scooped the newborn up sniffing the child.
The world clicked back into focus for Angel. He reached for his child. Christina growled momentarily but, his scent apart of the infant's, allowed him access. Having committed its -- the men still didn't know what sex it was -- scent to memory she proceeded to lick the blood from its body. "Bishop," he murmured, "I need scissors or a knife, something for the umbilical cord."
The Watcher nodded quietly exiting the small room. Returning he handed the item to Angel. Gently, gently he pried the child from it's mother's arms and cut the umbilical cord. Reaching for a sufficiently clean cloth he wrapped the girl -- it was a girl -- and walked towards Bishop. "Take her inside, clean her up. We'll leave for the hospital as soon as I'm done here." Wordlessly the Watcher took the child out of the room.
"What?" Christina lunged into a semi-crouched position, "no! Where is he taking my baby?" Her voice was rough with disbelief and the remnant pain of childbirth.
"He's going to wash her," Angel answered calmly.
"I want her. I want my baby." Looking up into his hard eyes she did what she'd hoped not to and pleaded. "Angel, please, just for a little while. Please, she's my baby." She needed, Christina needed to hold her child in her arms one more time. Forever.
"The deal was you'd give her up if she was born human."
"Please --"
"That was the deal Christina."
"You also promised to kill me," she croaked. It was hard to talk, her throat thick with unshed tears. "Please . . ."
"Be gone by the time we come back or I'll stake you myself," was his final softly delivered ultimatum. When she lunged for him a cross blossomed on her chest. "It's a promise," he said before turning around and leaving.
Christina stared at the closed green door in wide-eyed disbelief. Slowly Angel's words sank beneath her skin. She closed her eyes willing away the tears the hurt and the pain. It was a good thing she was a vampire because the old her would have wanted to fall through the floor. The old her would have wanted to die. The old her wouldn't have known what to do with the hole that had been formed in her heart. It hadn't been there before, there hadn't been a place for it until she held that tiny pale body in her arms. A new place had been created and now it was empty. The old her would have sat there and cried in the middle of her mess, bloody, exhausted and unable to figure out what she'd do with herself.
No, this was a different Christina. This Christina knew the value of tooth and claw. There was nothing like a little revenge to make body and demon all better. This Christina picked herself up, wiped the blood from her eyes and walked away.
Angel's sleep was restless. The baby woke him at all hours of the night and dreams filled his every sleeping moment. There was a murmuring his dream. The baby again. It was a fight to pull himself from that small measure of pe--
"I said wake up Angel!"
His eyes were opened. Yellow filled his vision. "That's better." Pain blossomed in Angel's skull.
"Ssss!"
"Looky here Princess, the Poof's awake again."
"Yummy. Does that mean I can eat him now? Hmm?" Angel's pain filled eyes opened to . . .Druscilla and Spike? But Druscilla was long gone and she didn't have blue hair. "Please, Sire."
Spike ran a finger down his childe's cheek. "All in good time luv. Can't Daddy have a taste first?" Spike left his returned childe and stalked toward the chained man. "Isn't that right Sire or should I call you that anymore? Sire gets firsts, isn't that so?
"Look Kitten, the great Angelus bare chested and chained in a rat infested basement by his wife and erstwhile childe. What would Darla say?"
"I guess," he gasped finding it difficult to breathe, "I guess it' a good thing she's dust."
Spike turned to Christi. "Look Princess, he's developed a sense of humor too."
"And what have you developed Spike, a better way to bleach your hair?"
Christina was suddenly beside him. "He's not very good at it," she said running a cold finger down his jaw. Angel flinched. "Not very nice either."
"I know. Come away pet." She obeyed.
"Don't listen to him Tina," Angel said, using her familial pet name. "He'll only turn on you once he has what he wants."
"Hmm," she put a sarcastically thoughtful finger to her chin, "now whom does that very apt description remind me of?" She turned to Spike, "Daddy? Anyone come to mind?"
He ran a hand lovingly through her hair. "Reminds me of that bad man over there Kitten. What say we make him pay?"
Christina jumped for joy, clapping her hands like a child. "Oh could we, could we really?" Spike looked at Angel over her shoulder and raised his eyebrows as if to say how could he deny her?
" 'Course we can Kitten."
"Oh good," she turned and the look in her eyes held anything but childish innocence. "Can I have a ciggy?"
"I didn't know you smoked pet."
"I don't but Angel will."
Oh and how he smoked . . .and scalded and peeled and, if she had more time, Christina thought she could make him flake too. Angel's chest and back would be forever marred with her acts of devotion. A delicate spider web of cuts lay white against his flushed back weeping blood. The skin was entirely gone from his left shoulder and there was an angry red acid trail down his stomach. The scent of his blood was thick in the air and she was hungry for revenge. And of course there were all the scars that couldn't be seen. The ones that would take years to catalogue; they would haunt his dreams until he died.
("Did you know you scream in your sleep sometimes, lover?" she whispers in your ear. Somewhere between pain and misery you understand her. "You did it more when you were a vampire but sometimes you still do. I wonder . . .I wonder if I'll become one of the nightmares that haunts you in the night")
Spike had merely sat back and watched occasionally giving her advice as her creative mind went to work. And to think, she'd been living with Peaches for the first three months of her unlife. Without wanting to be he was proud.
"Daddy," she said pulling him out of his reverie, "come look at the pretty pattern I've made." The words were so like Dru but her voice held none of the insanity. It was all sarcasm brutal wit. Spike dropped his cigarette butt and walked around the belabored human. Crouching beside his creation he admired her handiwork. "Do you like it?" she purred.
"Absolutely Kitten. Absolutely. Does it taste as good as it looks?" She shrugged. "Hold the blighter would you?" Christina grasped Angel's shoulders firmly eliciting a howl of pain while Spike took a long lick of his bleeding back. When he thought he could take no more Christina kneaded the skinless shoulder. Angel's eyes rolled in the back of his head.
Spike laughed pulling her away. "You my dear were bloody marvelous and I mean that. Very bloody luv, just the way I like it."
Red hand went around his neck as she murmured into his ear, "Anything for you Sire."
Spike pulled her flush against his aroused body. "Anything?" he whispered back. She nodded. Viciously he bent her head exposing Christina's neck. They stayed that way for a moment, Spike awaiting her protest Christina awaiting his bite. When she did nothing he released her. "Good you meant it."
Of course she had. "Can we eat him now Sire?" she asked formally feeling as if she'd passed some kind of test. "I'm so hungry for his blood."
"Didn't take a nip?" She shook her head. "That's a good girl. Come then, time for your first revenge feed. Always bloody marvelous let me tell you," Spike said leading her by the hand, "especially coupled with a good torture session.
Christina's free hand idly toyed with her chain. There were two cats on it now sitting tail to tail instead of the cat and cross he'd given her years before, Angel noticed it for the first -- and the last he surmised -- time. It was like those two cats, two rather serpentine cats, that they approached him. For though he was kneeling on the floor arms outstretched chained to the wall they stalked him. They took their time circling him, deciding which place was the best to feed, how to humiliate him to the fullest. Didn't they know there was nothing left to kill?
The vampire couple knelt on either side of Angel's ravaged form. Christina had trouble keeping her human visage and she kept swaying toward him. Spike watched amused. "It's all right pet, you can feed now." With that she was free. Wrapping an arm about chest and angling her head so that her sire would have no trouble feeding also she plunged into Angel.
Still bemused the elder vampire looked over the human who had been his sire. "How does it feel mate," he whispered intimately into his ear, "to know everything you've worked so hard for is coming apart at the seams? How does it feel to know that in the end your soul was no use to you, that your no better than some vampire's meal?" caressing various wounds, "How does it feel to be utterly abandoned by everything you've ever loved and made your own? How does it feel to know the woman you love almost as much as life wants someone else more? How does it feel? Can you tell me that? How does it feel to have it all end the way it began?" Angel did not, could not answer but silent tears slipped from his pain clenched eyes. Spike knew it wasn't from either of their "tender" ministrations. It had taken years, decades but he'd won and now all Spike could stomach was a nip at his former sire's neck.
It was enough. Standing quickly he left Christina to her husband's remaining blood.
She was so beautiful. Christina stood in awe of the life she'd nurtured within herself for nearly a year, her reason for being a killer. Was it worth it, did she regret it? she asked herself. Yes it was worth it but did she regretted it . . .there were no easy answers to that.
It had been all she could do not to scoop up the child and hug her close to her chest but that was the blood rush talking. (She could still feel Angel's thoughts and memories tripping through her mind.) Instead she waiting and watched her child sleep. She caressed the little forehead, ran her fingers down the delicate delicate nose and around the bow of her lips. Then she just stared. Stared at this little piece of perfection that had come from her hell bound body, she stared and in the space of a moment lived out the life that would never be.
"When the night is come," really she had to leave but how could she go without singing one lullaby to her child? "And the land is dark and . . . and the moon is the only light we'll see." Her voice caught and there was stinging behind her eyes. "No I won't," it cracked, "be afraid. No I won't be afraid just as . . .as long as you stand, stand by me." And she could not go on.
Laying the only gift she had -- the charmed lapis lazuli cuff her mother had given her on her sixteenth birthday -- on her daughter's small chest Christina fled into the night lapping at blood tears before they became someone else's ruby pearls.
"Everyone," Spike called out, "I want you to meet the newest member of our little clan. Gather 'round now. Everyone this is Christina, Christina this is everyone. She is my childe and I expect you to treat her with respect," he warned the minions.
The nodded grudgingly.
"Oo," one voice piped up. Spike rolled his eyes. He was sure she'd gone out that night. "Look Spiky, it's like we have a little family," Harmony said making her way through the small gathering. Though they'd moved away, the other vampires didn't go far wanting to see how their, er, "Mistress" would react to the vampiress. "You can call me Mommy," Harm said as if talking to a true child, "and I'll call you things like sweetheart and baby but first we have to do something about your hair. I mean blue so not in. But," she as if she'd make exceptions this one time, "I suppose as a new vampire you don't exactly know how things work. That's okay I can teach --" She made the mistake of reaching for the fledgling's hair.
Christina pulled the elder vampiress within reach of her fangs but kept her human facade. "I don't know," she whispered just loud enough for Spike to hear, "how you survived the past fifty plus years but if you bother me you won't survive the next five minutes," and pushed Harmony away.
Instantly Harm's demon came to the fore. "You insolent little . . . How dare you talk to your elder like --"
Spike knew that to the minions it appeared that Christina had merely pushed the air in front of her somehow propelling Harmony a good twenty feet away but he'd seen her rush the dumb blonde. Oh yes, it had been a good idea turning a Slayer.
"Don't cross me, Blondie," she growled. Turning to Spike she said, "So I guess this gives you the perfect excuse to stake me. Not that you need a reason," she added with a raised brow.
"How's that love?"
"We both know that 'luv' 'Kitten' stuff was for Angel's benefit. Now that he's out of the way I suspect you want nothing to do with me."
"Speaking of, Kitten, what did you do with Angel's body?"
Shrugging she said, "Let's say I made him someone's birthday and Christmas gift for the rest of their lives and leave it at that." She looked at him with steady brown eyes. The minions still circled sensing the show wasn't quite over.
"Do you want to be staked?"
"Not particularly but I figured I might as well bite the wooden bullet."
"I could make you bloody marvelous. I've seen you work luv and you could be more terrifying than Angelus the Scourge of Effin' Europe." Spike put his hands on her upper arms, "Or I could stake you. Get rid of the last remnant of my bloody sire."
"You could. It's your choice but I'd think you want to drink him down first," and so saying flicked her hair over her shoulder baring her jugular to him. Instantly Spike was holding her close savoring the taste of his first and only childe and the man that had been both their lovers. He was keeping this one. In a decade or two he could even love her.
It was waiting for him the second week he woke with the phantom like pains that had no choice but to haunt him. The doctors had been able to remove most of the scars but the new skin on his shoulder was still overly sensitive and he felt every trapped muscle beneath his spider webbed back. Both would leave lasting scars. The new skin on his shoulder would never match the rest and though the wounds inflicted on his back her neat and delicate they were deep.
For once he hadn't been awakened by the baby. Peeking into her room she lay sound asleep a bit of silver clutched in her fist. It was the same silver he'd found her holding when he woke from his blood-loss induced torpor. He didn't allow himself to think what it meant, that bit of silver and lapis. Just let her hold onto it, hold onto it and let her innocently embrace the things he needed to forget. Somehow he'd managed to go without naming her. She was the baby. She was "She." She was precious and beautiful and good-natured and looked like her mother.
Ghosting through the apartment something felt off. The baby wasn't up but something else was missing.
The music. It was 6:10 and there was no music coming from the imbedded speakers. He went over to the house computer. Instead of showing him that morning's selections as it always did it flashed a mail sign. Seating himself before the flatscreen he tapped the icon. Instantly it opened revealing a smiling face he knew too well. "Play?" the computer asked. He tapped that icon.
"Hey Lover, Imza," she greeted him, her smile restrained. "If you're getting this then I'm either dead or we're divorced or -- best yet -- I'm old and senile and therefore forgetful. However if the last two don't apply then I should have been dead about three or four weeks now. I'm sorry love, I never meant it to happen this way. I -- darnit! You would come home now wouldn't you . . ." The recording blacked out for a moment before starting again. Once again he was prompted to press Play.
"Sorry, you came home early and . . .not appropriate talk girlie," she said to herself. "Anywho like I was saying I'm dead. Wow, how weird is it to be saying that?
"Um, let's see, at the time I'm recording this we've been married a whole three months. That's how I chose the three weeks time limit. Every three weeks I have to put in a password to this file or else it'll send this recording to you.
"Now it is my utter wish you never see this. Maybe we're both old and gray now and all this tech is obsolete so it dropped this off by mistake. Hey, maybe we have kids," she smiled at the thought, "although I know you don't want any now." Laughing she added, "As if we could. But um, what I really wanted to tell you is to be happy. Yeah, message from the other side and it's be happy. How lame is that?" she asked grinning at him. She was so young then: just turned twenty-one. "But I mean it you big broody lug! I'll admit I want to be the one the who you become human for but I'll take this vampire forever if I have to."
Her smile dimmed and she looked at, presumably, her hands. "You know," she looked up at him through her lashes from across time, "I never believed you love me, not even now. There were lots of times I was sure you'd realize you could do better and just walk away."
("You know, I never believed you loved me, really loved me. Oh sometimes I was sure of it. . .")
"But I want you to know --"
("but lots of times I was equally if not positive that you'd realize you could do better and walk away. That is until I bit you. Now I know. Too bad you'll never know I guess.")
"-- that I love you. That I've loved you for a very long time. Do you remember our first kiss. When you said you shouldn't have kissed me it felt like you had thrown a shard of glass at me: invisible but deadly. Then you kept apologizing and it was like you were tossin'em out willy-nilly," he hears her say but it is two voices in his head. Which one is real?
(She looks down at you full of thinly veiled contempt and utterly complete hatred. "Know this, I saved you for her sake. If I thought Sp-- If I thought he wouldn't hurt her you would be dead right now. The next time we meet lover I hope you've learned how to keep your promises. For your sake hope that when next we meet there's six feet of earth between us.")
She blushed fiercely, something she rarely did. "I love you. I thought I knew what it was before and maybe when I have my own child I'll learn another dimension to it. All I know right now, though, is I love you and hard as it may be to hear it I'm glad I've died before you. I don't know if I could take never being able to hold you in my arms just one more time. Forever. I know you don't see it that way but that's how I am. I love things fiercely and to be parted from something like -- well whoever was responsible might as well kill me or look into witness protection," she said with a grin.
She paused for a moment then stared intently at the screen, at him. "No matter what people may tell you, no matter what they may say about what we had who we were and what we've done know that I don't blame you. I don't blame you for bringing me to LA, for teaching me to become a Slayer for being my backup and my shoulder to cry on. They don't know what we've been through. They haven't been covered with demon snot. They don't love you like I do.
"I love you Angel, Angelus and Liam. I love you all. I love you." She blushed furiously as if embarrassed to say it out loud.
"Um, anyway, business. You might want to know -- or maybe not -- the password to this whole file is gra. Isn't that ironic, the word for 'love' in Gaelic that I could never get my American mouth to like is the one I choose for my password. Anywho, inside the folder you'll find a few, uh, important files. There are some things Wes wanted me to hold onto . . .uh my will. I know, depressing as mudo crudoff. There's also some stuff I want --"
Grace. He would name their daughter Grace. The woman talking to him so earnestly across time would have liked that.