A Gift

Author: Emily

Parts: 11 - 20

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~Part: 11~

Angelus stayed back for the moment, allowing the Scoobies to keep the distance they so obviously craved. Not that it would do them any good. He was barely visible in the shadows, leaning against one of the library stacks and languidly trailing his eyes over each of them as he watched with a lazy smile on his face. Oh, this was fun. Buffy had obviously been crying. From the looks of it, Xander had, too. Giles, just as obviously, hadn’t cried. He had the British, stiff-upper-lip thing going for him, but he looked as if someone had drained him of half of his blood. Hmm, that was an interesting idea… maybe later.

Cordelia took a deliberate step away from him, carefully stepping into some sunlight streaming through a window. Ah, Cordelia, practical and self-interested to the last. The short guy with the funny hair, what was his name again? Izzy? Uzzi? Oz. That’s it. He didn’t step away. Oz took a single step closer. He looked like he wanted to tear something apart, but he was holding himself together.

And Jenny, the pretty little gypsy. (Looking at her, he wondered why it had taken him so long to discover her true identity. She bore a startling resemblance to the gypsy girl that started the whole mess. It would give the whole situation a certain sort of symmetry when he killed her, as well.) She looked scared. And nervous. Scared of him, but nervous about… something else. Yes, she was definitely hiding something. But he’d deal with that (and with her) later.

“Hello, lover,” he purred at Buffy, his smile expanding to a cat-that-ate-the-canary kind of grin. “Did you get my letter?” His gaze followed the direction of her eyes as she automatically glanced over to the library table where he could see torn scraps of drawing paper. Angelus stalked over to the table, his smile continuing to grow as he watched the others back away. He seated himself on the table, rifling through the scraps.

“I’m hurt that you didn’t choose to treasure it,” he said, holding a hand over his heart. “After all, it is the last you’ll be seeing of her for a while.” He noted with pleasure that everyone in the room flinched, but kept his attention ostensibly on the scraps of paper, arranging them as if trying to recreate the image they had held. “I thought it was a very good rendering, myself. Didn’t you like it?” he asked, directing the question to Buffy, his tone innocent and courteous, as if he were asking her opinion of a restaurant or maybe a movie. Buffy’s eyes closed and yet another tear slid down her face, but she could not bring herself to answer.

“No matter,” Angelus continued, abandoning the scraps of paper. “I can always draw more for you later.” Angelus’ mind drifted over that possibility. Maybe when he headed back to the mansion, he’d grab his sketchbook and take down a few drawings of Willow covered in blood and bruises. He could give one to Buffy. And he could keep some for himself. There was no denying, Willow looked surprisingly lovely covered and clothed in only blood and bruises. It was a memory worth preserving.

“What have you done to Willow?” Xander asked, his strained voice showing every nuance of his desperation.

“Kissed her, tasted her blood, knocked her unconscious and dragged her back to my lair, naturally,” Angelus answered, smirking at the memory. Of course, after that, he had handcuffed her to the bed and left her as a present for Spike, but he’d leave that out, for now. It would be more fun to tell them in a minute, once they had stewed over what they had been told.

He watched them as they all shuddered as they processed his statements describing Willow’s kidnapping. He could tell they were trying to figure out whether or not he was telling the truth. They were fools. Didn’t they realize it was much more fun to hurt people with the truth?

“Why?” Buffy asked. Her voice was barely a whisper, but the utter despair that filled it made it carry so that it was clearly heard by everyone in the room.

“Several reasons, really,” Angelus answered. He ticked them off on his fingers. “I wanted to punish her, I wanted to provide amusement for my childe’s childe, I wanted to hurt each and every one of you, and,” Angelus concluded with a shrug, “I was bored.”

Xander was engaged in a raging battle for self-control. His body shook with effort to remain restrained and he was gripping the table hard as if to see which would break first: the wood, or the bones in his hands. Buffy and Jenny were openly crying. Oz simply looked lost, as if the world had somehow lost its meaning. Cordelia looked scared and alone as she stood in the patch of sunlight, her eyes on the window and she scanned the sky nervously for any clouds that might block the sun. Giles looked murderous, but he alone was calm enough to respond.

“What are your intentions now?” he asked.

“It’s not my intentions you should be worried about, Ripper,” Angelus responded, noticing that Giles did not so much as flinch at the despised nickname. It seemed he didn’t mind letting out a little Ripper when Willow was in danger. Angelus’ smirk grew wider. This was working even better than he had planned.

This time it was Jenny who stepped forward. “What do you mean?” she asked.

“I mean that Willow is no longer my responsibility,” Angelus replied, deliberately drawing out the moment, prolonging their agony.

“Damn you, Angelus,” Xander hissed, finally pushed beyond his self-control. “Enough of the dramatics. Say what you came to say.”

Angelus laughed. “Right you are, boy,” he replied, standing at last and stalking closer to where the others stood. “I wanted to be sure that all of you had the comfort of knowing that Willow is in good hands. Not my hands, obviously.” Angelus continued walking, moving slowly but deliberately over to Buffy, who flinched at his approach but did not step away. “I wouldn’t want anything to touch the time I devote to you.” Angelus said, his voice a mocking parody of a lover’s whisper, as he traced the trail of a tear down her cheek with the tip of a finger. “So I made a gift of her, to someone who feels as deeply about all of you as I do.”

Giles understood first. “Good Lord, no,” he whispered, as the last bit of color drained from his face, which filled, instead, with an expression of unmitigated horror. He started shaking as his legs gave out underneath him. Buffy and Jenny rushed over and caught him before he fell, leading him over to a chair in which he sat, slumped over, oblivious to their frantic concern.

Angelus’ laugh was clearly delighted. Giles’ pain and fear were pouring off of him in waves so thick, Angelus could practically taste them, and it would only get better when the rest of the group caught on. “Ah, Ripper. I had a feeling that you’d be the one to figure it out.”

“Giles, what is it?” Buffy pleaded, kneeling next to his chair and grasping his hand tightly. “Please, tell me what’s wrong.”

Giles sat very still, and for a long, heartbreaking moment, Buffy was afraid he had gone into some kind of shock. She was on the verge of panic, faced with far too many situations that she did not know how to handle. Fortunately, Giles managed to pull himself out of his daze sufficiently to reply. “Willow,” he whispered. “Angelus has given Willow… to Spike.”

“You bastard!” Xander screamed, unable to hold himself back any longer. He released the table and threw himself in Angelus’ direction. He didn’t care if he got himself killed, as long as he got in one good blow. All he could think of was how he wanted Angelus to hurt, to scream, to bleed… like Willow was hurting. And screaming. And bleeding. Oz reacted first, and rushed over and grabbed Xander’s arm before he could reach Angelus. He managed to hold him back, but Xander was struggling like a madman and Oz could barely keep him in place. Cordelia, torn, made the decision to place someone else’s safety above her own. She abandoned her patch of sunlight to pull him back, clinging to him, begging him to calm down.

Xander kept thrashing out against the restraint, overcome with the urge to tear Angelus apart, or die trying. His sweet, innocent, wonderful Willow was, even at that very moment, at the mercy of Spike: possibly the only vampire on the hellmouth who hated them equally, if not more, than Angelus. Spike, who was confined to the lair with a broken back, and had nothing to do day or night but stew over his resentments, and take them out on his new pet.

Angelus chuckled as he watched Xander’s struggle. He took a few steps closer to him. “And if you got loose, boy,” he said, his tone deliberately mocking, “what do you think you could do? Take a swing at me? You wouldn’t stand a chance.” He stepped away from Xander, turning his back to him to face Giles and Buffy, blatantly ignoring the possibility of Xander as any kind of threat.

“In this situation,” he continued with a smile, “none of you stand a chance. You could all attack me here and now and it wouldn’t change a thing. Even if you won, even if you dusted me and scattered my ashes to the four winds, you couldn’t undo what has been done. Willow would still belong to Spike. He won’t give up his toy that easily. He has her handcuffed to his bed and he will see to it that she does not leave his side. Here’s your best case scenario: if you defeated me, took my lair by storm, defeated all the minions and Drusilla and managed to surround Spike before he had a chance to get away, you still wouldn’t be able to get to him before he had a chance to snap her neck.”

Angelus walked back over to the table and ran his hand through the scraps of torn paper. “You should have kept the drawing,” he said, again. “To remember her by.”

He strolled back in the direction of the exit, talking as he went. “As fun as this has been, I really should be getting back. Spike was putting her through some training when I left, and I’d hate to miss the ending. Willow screams so beautifully, or didn’t you know that about her? I just learned it, myself, but I plan to become better informed about it later. I’ll keep you posted.”

He turned as he reached the end of the stacks. “Don’t look so sad, the game is just beginning. I’d hate to see you forfeit this early. Where would the fun be in that?” He blew Buffy a kiss. “I’ll see you later, lover.”

Then he disappeared into the shadows. They could vaguely hear him exit into the sewers, whistling as he went.

~Part: 12~

As Angelus left the library after his highly successful confrontation with the Scoobies, he considered killing Jenny before going back home. It would be easy, hell, it would be fun, and it would save him a trip back that evening. He was feeling a bit peckish. If memory served, gypsies made very pleasant mid-afternoon snacks. And Jenny would be better than the average gypsy. She had better hygiene.

He gave it a few moments of serious thought before shaking his head reluctantly and moving on. He couldn’t kill her yet. It wouldn’t make any sense to kill the woman before he knew exactly what she had planned. No, it would be better to wait until tonight, when Dru would have the chance to go to the shop and get the details he needed. He returned his thoughts to a more cheerful topic, reliving in his mind the scene he had just enacted in the library.

<That went well.> Angelus thought to himself as he strolled through the sewers, whistling “Bad” by Michael Jackson. Both Angel and Angelus had hated the 80s (for widely different reasons, of course), but Angelus had to admit, the song seemed to fit today. He was big, he was bad, he was scary, and he was enjoying every single second of it. The sound of his whistling echoed eerily through the sewers tunnels as he bounced in time with the music.

He had made an art out of taunting Buffy since his return, but never before had it been as enjoyable as it had proven today. Perhaps in the past he had set his sights too small. He had only taunted and tortured Buffy. He had done that today, of course. He had made Buffy cry. A lot. That was always fun. But he hadn’t limited himself to her. Xander had been crying as well, and Giles had seemed to be resting right on the verge of a nervous breakdown. Yes, it was much more fun to see all of them so broken up. He couldn’t believe how well his little kidnapping had paid off.

All over a little redhead who had been ridiculously easy to snatch. That was what made it so much fun. They all knew that, all those miserably self-righteous holier-than-thou Scoobies; they knew precisely how simple it had been for him to kidnap Willow right under their oblivious noses. She was impossibly dear to each and every one of them, and they had let this happen. In fact, they were still letting this happen, he reminded himself as he remembered the state in which he had left Willow at the mansion. Even as her friends wept over her and screamed at him, Willow was being beaten within an inch of her life. He was willing to bet that Buffy, Xander, Giles, Jenny, maybe even that Oz boy were all wallowing in guilt, torturing themselves by running over the reasons why they believed it was all their fault.

Good.

He wanted them to feel guilty.

That had been the plan.

Well, that had not *exactly* been the plan since he hadn’t exactly *had* a plan when he snatched Willow. He had truly intended to sneak into her room and simply kill her fish. He knew that it would scare her. He knew that it would rattle Buffy. He knew that that it would make all of them feel helpless and vulnerable. That *had* been the plan. Angelus had always been the quintessential planner. You do not become Scourge of Europe by acting hastily. He had given it considerable thought, carefully choosing the perfect thing to leave for Willow. He had always had a thing for pets. He wished she had a puppy. Puppies were fun.

Snatching Willow had been a whim, a moment’s bright inspiration after sneaking into her room. Her room had seemed so sweet and innocent and vulnerable. Just like Willow. The temptation had been overwhelming. He was helpless to resist the opportunity that she presented. It wasn’t until she was passed out in his arms as he carried her to the mansion that he truly calculated the impact of his actions.

Angelus was an expert on guilt. When you’re muzzled and chained every minute of every hour of every day to a miserable soul that does nothing but wallow in remorse for a century, you pick up some pointers on how to make someone feel really, really guilty. That was pretty much the only good thing Angelus had gotten from the soul. If Angelus had given it much thought at the time, he probably would have realized that rather than make the Scoobies feel vulnerable, what he truly needed to do to destroy them inside and out was to make them feel guilty. The guilt would eat away at them, keep them up nights, pondering impossible “what ifs” while they tossed and turned, spending every moment aware of how they had let down the people they cared about.

Willow was a complete innocent: a truly, sincerely good person who only wanted the best for everyone and was willing to give anyone a chance. That was what made her the perfect target. Things like this weren’t supposed to happen to girls like her. Everyone tried to believe that there was some special providence to protect such sweetness and virtue and shield it from danger. There wasn’t. She was blameless and vulnerable and he had exploited that and used it to put her in his control. And now he got to watch it eat away at her friends.

Jenny would feel guilty. Granted, she wouldn’t have long to feel guilty since he was going to be killing her that night, but still, for those few precious hours that she had left, she’d feel all the agony of culpability for what happened to Willow. After all, not only was Willow her protégé, but also, Jenny had known what Angelus was capable of, and she had known what it would take to let him out of his cage and she had kept her silence. There appeared to Angelus to be a sort of poetic justice in causing the woman to feel guilt. After all, she belonged to the people who had cursed him with a guilty conscience for the past century. Payback’s a bitch.

Giles, the stoic watcher with the shady past. He could add this to the pile of his guilt, letting his own conscience take the form of an archaic type of torture: crushing someone slowly with increasingly heavy stones. Willow had been his protégé as well. Together, they had read through countless dusty books that recounted all of the terrible, evil things vampires were capable of. Maybe he’d even include this in his watcher’s diary for all of posterity to see how he allowed his research assistant and surrogate daughter to be taken by the things that go bump in the night. This wouldn’t break Giles; he had too much British stubbornness for that. Killing Jenny. That might break him. Anyway, it would be fun to find out. Until then, it was amusing to see how the guilt left him weak, shattered, very nearly strained beyond capacity.

Xander would be inconsolable for a large chunk of the foreseeable future. Angelus knew how close the boy had always been to Willow. That time after Angel, Xander and Willow had run down the address on Billy Fordham, all those months ago, Angel had walked Willow home. She had been apologizing for Xander’s behavior, as usual, and in his defense, she had told Angel about a promise Xander had made her. Apparently, at the Harvest, Xander had had to stake a boy who used to be one of his best friends. That night, Xander had shown up at Willow’s door, knowing that she needed him, and that he needed her. They had held each other all night while she cried and as the sun came up, he promised her that he’d always keep her safe, and that he’d never let that happen to her. This must be ripping the boy apart. Not only did he not keep his word, but in addition, at the moment the promise was being broken, he was probably occupied with Cordelia. Angelus smiled. Xander had always said that Angel couldn’t be trusted, that a vampire could never be relied upon. Angelus wondered how much Xander was enjoying being proved right.

And then there was the slayer. He remembered the first time he had seen her, sitting in the sunlight, the perfect picture of obliviousness. (Angel had categorized it as innocence; Angelus had called it obliviousness. And stupidity. That, too.) She had always been so perky. Even when she found out about her destiny and killed her first vamp, she still managed to recover into the nauseatingly upbeat, punning slayer that had so enraptured his soul. This was the first glimpse he had seen of her the way he really wanted her: shattered, hopeless, defenseless. Not even when he first re-emerged and broke her heart had she been so truly hurt. That was just pain. This was pain, on top of guilt. Her fragile best friend was undergoing unspeakable torture, because of her. Her other best friend probably blamed her. Her mentor/advisor was about to go off the deep end. Poor little Buffy. So abandoned. So alone. So destroyed. So positively *perfect*.

The true genius of the plan had been to give Willow to Spike. After all, Angelus devoted a lot of time to taunting Buffy on patrol and leaving dead classmates for her to find. Spike stayed home all the time. He could devote every minute of his complete attention to training and enjoying Willow. Angelus took immense pleasure in letting the slayer know that her bestest friend had the full attention of one of the most feared vampires in the world who, coincidentally, hated the slayer (and her sickeningly virtuous associates) with a passion that rocked the heavens.  Giles knew what Spike was capable of. Buffy knew precisely how much anger Spike had to work through. Even Xander knew that Spike had been their most implacable enemy, often beaten but never defeated. And they all knew that with Spike glued to Willow’s side, a rescue mission didn’t stand a chance.

Angelus smiled again. Damn, he did good work.

He had experienced some minor trepidation immediately after his return when he worried that perhaps he was out of practice. After all, it had been a very long time since he had been the Scourge of Europe. Openly helping the slayer (and he still had some problems understanding how even Angel could have sunk so low) had done such damage to his reputation that he had actually had to fight some of the minions upon his return. The new generation had no respect for their elders and no memory of legends… until they were reminded. Angelus always enjoyed the chance to provide a refresher course on precisely why he should be feared. He knew he was just as strong as he had ever been, if not stronger. But he had not had the opportunity to be cunning or devious or maliciously and diabolically clever in such a very long time, he was afraid that his plotting skills might have diminished. He needn’t have worried. This plan was proving to be one of his best. He’d be remembered for this one.

But while his legend was secure, his day was depressingly empty. Taunting the children had been every bit as much fun as he had anticipated, but it was over now and he had to find a new amusement for the remaining daylight hours. He had no plans until that evening. Angelus sighed. Killing the teacher was out, for now, as tempting as the thought had been. So what could he do to fill this endless afternoon? Fuck Dru? Nah, he’d had enough of that from the morning romp. Taunt Spike? While that was always fun, the best way to do that was to fuck Dru and he had already decided that he wasn’t in the mood. So what did that leave?

A thought occurred to him that caused his most wicked smile to blossom across his face. He knew just what he wanted to do. There was, now, a new and interesting way to taunt Spike. And hurt Buffy. And thoroughly amuse himself, all at once. He resumed his whistling as he continued his walk back to the mansion and his entertainment for the afternoon.

~Part: 13~

For a few long moments after Angelus left, the silence was only broken by the wrenching sound of heartbreaking sobs. They weren’t Buffy’s. She was crying silently from where she was seating on the floor, beside Giles’ chair. Giles showed no sign of tears. In truth, Giles showed no signs of life. He remained slumped in his chair, his unblinking eyes glazed over in shock and pain. The unrestrained sobs were Xander’s, crying as if his very soul would break. He wished it would. Guilt and fear and dread and humiliation crashed over him in seemingly endless waves.

Cordelia tried to comfort him, leaning over him from behind with her arms wrapped around him and her head resting on top of his, holding him close. He didn’t seem to notice. His complete lack of response stunned her. Even when they hated each other, even when they fought constantly, Xander had always responded instantly to her touch. But now, he seemed unaware of it; he was unaware of anything but the pain in which he was drowning.

Cordelia was silent as she tried desperately to blink back the tears that filled her eyes. It hurt her terribly to see Xander in pain, much more than she would have thought. And it was surprisingly painful to think of Willow at the mercy of those monsters. Somehow, in spite of herself, she had begun to… care… about all of them and maybe had even begun to… love… Xander. But in spite of this confusing onslaught of emotions, she was still Queen C. Even as she dabbed away her tears (carefully blotting her eyes so as not to smear her mascara) and comforted Xander, a part of her mind still knew that when they were finished crying and yelling at each other (she knew the yelling would come next) they’d have to leave the library and get on with the day. She was able to grasp what the others could not seem to conceive: even though Willow was captured, leaving a gaping hole in their lives, life still had no choice but to go on.

The same thought had occurred to Oz, as well. Life would go on. Without Willow. From what Angelus had said, Oz knew without a doubt that there was no way to turn back the clock and bring things back to how they were only a day ago. What was done was done. They wouldn’t get Willow back. She was gone, forever. And his life would have to go on without her. He could have loved her… but that wasn’t an option, now. Suddenly, he couldn’t bear to be in the library anymore. It reminded him far too strongly of Willow. He had only started spending time there to be with her. If his life was going to go on, if he was going to live out the rest of his time without the girl he was starting to love, then he might as well start moving on now. He gathered his stuff and left. If things had been different, if there was some chance of getting her back, maybe he would have acted differently. Maybe he would have stayed. But there was no longer anything reason for him to stay. He didn’t look back. The Scooby chapter of his life had ended. The door shut quietly behind him. No one looked up at the sound.

Jenny watched as Cordelia comforted Xander and ached to do the same for Giles, the man she now admitted that she loved. She tried to reach for him, tried to take his hand to offer him some comfort. Even though he was still angry with her, she wanted him to know that she was there, that she cared about him, that she would do anything she could to help him through this. In the first sign of life he had shown in the past ten minutes, he pulled it out of her reach. Jenny’s heart sank. She knew she deserved that. She sighed. She had no right to be there; she was a tourist to their pain, obviously intruding where they did not want her to be. <I’ll make it up to you,> she silently vowed. <Rupert, Buffy, and… Willow…> (even thinking the girl’s name was difficult) <I’ll make it up to all of you.> What she had seen and heard only served to make her more determined. She knew she was making progress on the soul restoration curse. It wouldn’t be much longer now. Silently, she slipped out of the library, heading back to her classroom to tinker with the curse awhile longer. She had a planning period after lunch, so she still had a solid hour in which to work. <Not much longer, now,> she thought as she headed down the hallway. <Not much longer till I can make things right, till I can make it up to you. All of you.> Her departure went unnoticed, as well.

Giles was the first to come out of his daze. This was where the Watcher’s training came to the acid test. He was the supervisor and mentor of a teenage girl who was not expected to live into her twenties. He had been trained to deal with loss efficiently, not to let it cloud his judgment. It broke his heart to think of Willow held captive by Angelus and Spike, but he had no choice to agree with Angelus’ words. Even in the best-case scenario, if they managed to defeat everyone but Spike (which Giles knew was highly unlikely) Spike could still kill Willow before they could rescue her. They would continue to research, of course. Angelus and his childer were a dangerous force in Sunnydale. Maybe with time and dedication and voluminous research, they would find some way to defeat them. And maybe… maybe if they did, there would be some way to rescue Willow. But they couldn’t count on that.

It broke Giles’ heart to admit, even to himself, that he wouldn’t try to rescue the girl. He knew that all the children looked to him as something of a father figure, but with Willow, it had been something more. She had been his protégé, his comrade-in-arms. He had taken such delight in teaching her and training her. He knew she had wanted to pursue a career as a Watcher and he… had been…so very proud of her. Even now, just thinking about her conjured up dozens of images and memories, each of which struck at the heart. It was horribly wrong that such a thing had happened to her, but it had happened, and there was nothing he could do to change that, now. Watchers are trained to let go, to move on. No one is of importance except for the slayer and even she is replaceable. The attitude is hard and callous and cruel, and necessary to survive life as a watcher.

Giles took off his glasses and wearily rubbed his eyes, pinching the bridge of his nose. Then he opened his eyes, put back on his glasses, and spoke.

“Lunch period is nearly over. You children had better get ready for your next classes.” They all looked at him in bewilderment, as if they no longer understood the language that he was speaking.

“And that’s it?” Xander hissed, his face hardening. “We’re supposed to just go to class and pretend that nothing’s wrong?”

“There’s nothing that can be done,” Giles replied, quietly.

“Like Hell, there’s nothing that can be done!” Xander yelled, jumping to his feet. “We could go after her!”

“No, Xander, we can’t,” Buffy answered, as she slowly stood from the floor. “I hate to say it, but Angelus was right. There’s no way we could get in and kill all of them before they had a chance to kill Willow.”

“So we just sit back and let it happen?” Xander yelled. “Christ, Buffy, didn’t you hear what he said? Spike has Willow handcuffed to his bed! She has been there since last night while he did… things… to her,” Xander’s voice started to crack and break at the thought of the agony Willow must be in “… that…made her… scream.” His voice was a whisper by the time he reached the last word. “She’s screaming, Buffy,” he continued, his voice in an intense whisper, “screaming for help, screaming for *us* because we’re supposed to love her and protect her. She’s screaming for us to rescue her and we’re just going to leave her there?”

Tears were streaming down Buffy’s face unchecked. “I don’t know,” she whispered. Then she said it again, screaming this time. “I don’t know! I don’t know what to do, I don’t know what to think, I… I’m just trying to do the right thing, for all of us! But I don’t know what that is! And I…” she turned and looked to Giles, in desperation. He was her watcher; he was supposed to tell her what to do. That’s what watchers were for. Slayers weren’t supposed to have all the answers. They were just teenage girls who were lost and confused and in desperate need of guidance. If Giles told her that she was strong enough to take on Angelus’ entire household, then she’d believe him and she’d go storming in to save her friend.

“Buffy’s quite right,” Giles stated, and Buffy’s shoulders sagged. This was she had expected him to say, but it still hurt. Deep down, she had hoped that he’d say that she was wrong, that there *was* something they could do, that there was a spell or a ritual or a device that they could use to save Willow and defeat Angelus and live happily ever after. She had hoped for that, from the moment she realized that Willow was missing. But she hadn’t expected it. This was what she had expected. “Any attempt to go after Willow would be suicidal, not to mention, pointless. With what we know now,” he said, careful to stress those words, “there’s no way we could get to Willow in time to rescue her. Angelus has built a very strong force behind him.”

“And how in hell did we let that happen?” Xander yelled. “How did we let him ‘build a very strong force’? He’s been back for a month! We’ve had a month to stop him, a month to keep him from building enough power to hurt us.” Xander stalked over to Buffy, staring her in the face, “Why the hell haven’t we killed him yet? He’s a vampire, Buffy. You’re a vampire slayer. If you had done your job a month ago, we wouldn’t be in this situation now.”

Buffy opened her mouth but the words just wouldn’t come out. All she seemed capable of now were more tears.

“Xander, that’s enough,” Giles stated firmly. “Buffy is no more responsible for the actions of Angelus than any of the other slayers who lived during his reign as Scourge of Europe. If he was easy to slay, he would have been dust years ago.”

“And were all those slayers in love with him?” Xander asked, snidely.

“I said that’s enough,” Giles interrupted in a deadly cold tone. Xander was overstepping the line. Giles knew the boy was only lashing out in his grief, but that did not give him the right to try to break the slayer. “*At this time*, there’s nothing we can do. We will continue to research Angelus and his childer and we will continue to search for a way to stop him. Until we find one, anyone who attempts to rescue Willow will only be signing her death warrant as well as their own. Have I made myself clear?”

No one answered him.

“Have I made myself clear?” he asked again, his tone growing angry. It was unbearable that they had lost Willow. If they lost anyone else because the children were too stubborn to listen to reason then he wouldn’t be able to live with himself.

“Yes, Giles,” Buffy and Xander whispered, avoiding eye contact both with Giles and with each other.

Cordelia took Xander’s hand and led him out of the library. He followed her obediently. Buffy let them leave and then waited a minute. She wanted to give Xander a chance to get to his class before she left. He obviously wasn’t ready to be anywhere near her yet. After waiting what she considered to be a fair amount of time, she gathered her own things and left as well.

~Part: 14~

Spike looked down at Willow’s body where it lay unconscious at his feet and felt a reluctant surge of admiration for the battered and blood-soaked girl. He was finding himself forced to re-evaluation his initial opinion of her. There was more to her than he had suspected. Every single inch of her was covered with clear and unmistakable evidence of his particular form of “discipline.” It was far more than most humans he had ever encountered would have been able to bear. He knew from experience that the pain he had inflicted was enough to make grown men weep, strong men beg, and wise men forget how to do anything but whimper. Willow’s screams had echoed through the mansion but her eyes had remained dry. She did not cry. She did not beg. Instead she chose to recite, with letter-perfect accuracy, every word of a movie, just as he ordered. And through the agonizing pain that should have destroyed her, she held her resolve and refused to betray the people that she loved.

The longer Spike unlived, the harder it grew for him to maintain any pretense of respect for mankind. Every year that he spent on earth served to further convince him that humans were weak, foolish, heartless, spineless cattle, incapable of true emotion or firm resolve. The Judge had ridiculed Spike for his supposed humanity because he had proven himself capable of love, but Spike had always held that it was only demons that were capable of wholehearted expression of an emotion. After all, only someone who intended to worship his or her beloved for all time could forward any claim to true and everlasting love. Eternal love is only possible for immortals. The love of mere mortals was weak and transient in comparison. In one measly lifetime, they were capable of falling easily and repeatedly in and out of love. And they were always far too willing to betray anyone that they claimed to love for the sake of money, or power, or simply their own miserable safety. Spike used to enjoy, in his pre-wheelchair days, targeting lovey-dovey couples. The procedure was always the same. He would grab the woman and say that he’d let her go if the man agreed to stay in her place. Over ninety percent of the time, the men ran like scared rabbits. Occasionally he switched it, grabbing the man, instead. The women proved to be just as cowardly as the men.

His first impression of his new pet was that she was weak, even for a human. She seemed so tiny and fragile, and the information that Angelus gave of her only served to confirm his opinion. Angelus had debriefed the household on all the slayer’s friends, describing in detail all the weaknesses he had discovered in them in his soulful days. Willow had been characterized as painfully shy and totally inexperienced, a rather passive force driven along by the slayer’s powerful personality. Angelus, in his more personal conversations with Spike, had described the girl as pure, naïve innocence: the kind of person who truly believed that everyone was really good at heart. He had laughed at her, ridiculing her shy embarrassment when she invited Angel into her room that first time. If she was so flustered by the simple prospect of having a boy in her room, Spike had been convinced that as soon as she realized precisely what was in store for her as his possession, she’d be shattered to the point where all the slayer’s horses and all the slayer’s men could not put her together again.

Spike knew that this was yet another one of Angelus’ subtle insults. The older vampire loved to tease Spike and to turn everything, even a gift, into a type of pissing contest where Angelus could once again prove Spike’s inferiority. Angelus was trying to demean him, even with a gift. The presentation of such a weak girl for a pet implied that Spike was no longer able to handle someone stronger. While Angelus slowly broke the surprisingly powerful and capable slayer, Spike would break her weak, vulnerable, fragile and constantly docile best friend. When the odds were stacked like that, there was no way for Spike to come out on top. Even breaking the girl in record time would not look like an accomplishment. He had considered ignoring Angelus’ demands and killing the girl anyway. If Angelus wanted to punish him for it, then so be it. The punishment couldn’t be much worse than the slow torture he was already enduring.

But then the girl surprised him. From the moment she “woke up” and first looked at him so steadily with those wide green eyes, he had realized that she had more spirit than he ever would have expected. Even that first night, there were no traces of tears. She responded to him cautiously but intelligently. She was obviously (and naturally) concerned for her safety and hoping for her rescue, but she still listened to him carefully and proved to be surprisingly adept at following instructions, even when she was scared out of her wits.

The true surprise had been today. After several humiliating hours of giving surprisingly good head, he had expected the girl to be too embarrassed to look him in the eye, much less show any form of defiance. Her refusal to name the gypsy had shocked him, but he retained a large percentage of his contemptuous attitude, convinced that she had no real understanding of the sheer depth of punishment she was getting herself in to.

Truth be told, he was pleased with her naiveté. He relished the opportunity to really punish someone again. Confined to the house and restricted from his lover’s bed, he had been deprived of nearly all of his sources of exercise and amusement. A spot of torture would suit him perfectly. Though he had promised the girl at the beginning of his session that the punishment would be mild if she confessed, he admitted freely to himself that she was in for a thorough punishment no matter what she said. She could have confessed immediately and he still would have beaten her until she was unconscious. As he had explained to her the previous night, he didn’t need a reason to hit her. She existed now solely for his pleasure. And it gave him a great deal of pleasure to hit someone, over and over again. Her confession held no power to change that.

He had expected her to break into the standard tearful begging after the shock of the first blow. It didn’t happen. She had flinched, in obvious pain, but gave no other visible response. Dry-eyed and surprisingly unemotional, she had launched into the story that he had ordered her to recite. He had expected her photographic memory to fail her as the pain started to build. It didn’t. When she finally began to scream, he thought that the movie dialogue would stop, replaced with incoherent pleading and petitions to a silent God to save her. But the movie dialogue continued, punctuated but not interrupted by the continuing chorus of her screams.

He expected her to fall apart within the first five minutes. She didn’t. She held herself together, her usual awkwardness replaced with a sort of unconscious grace as she held her ground against him. Ten minutes. Half an hour. Even when she fell to the floor, unable to hold herself up any longer, she still refused to give in. Forty five minutes and there was Angelus, knocking on the door, saying he had figured it out and asking why Spike hadn’t sent word before. Spike had been forced to admit that the girl was still holding out.

Spike growled slightly at the memory of Angelus’ interruption. He hadn’t liked the way that Angelus had looked at his pet. He could have sworn he saw Angelus lick his lips slightly at the sight of her naked, battered body, as if she was a banquet spread out for Angelus’ own, personal enjoyment. Not that she hadn’t looked… delicious… but the girl belonged to Spike. Her body was bare and bloody for her instruction and Spike’s own pleasure. Angelus had very clearly given him full rights over the girl. Bloody bastard had no right to interfere anymore. She wasn’t his responsibility. Dru may belong to her sire, but Willow belonged to Spike. As mouthwatering as she may be, no one would be tasting her but him.

When he re-entered the room after his conversation with Angelus, Spike had had the overwhelming urge to do exactly that: to taste the girl, lick at the wounds that he had formed and savor the delicate tang of fresh, warm, virginal blood. But he did not allow himself to do so. From the heady scent in the air, Spike could tell that the girl’s blood was intoxicatingly sweet and pure, the true essence of temptation for a vampire with a sensitive palate such as Spike possessed. If he started tasting her, it would weaken his resolve and he would lose the focus he required to properly discipline her. She continued to defy him and he needed to make sure that she was correctly chastised. He needed all the focus he could maintain. Willow was proving to be more of a challenge than Spike had expected and even more than tasting her blood, Spike wanted to taste her tears, to see her break, to hear her beg. He’d wait to taste her until then.

But she wouldn’t break. For nearly two hours she screamed and moaned and recited movie dialogue while he beat her to a bloody pulp and still she did not break. The true surprise came when he confronted her with the truth. After all the time spent holding out against torture, she did not show a fraction of hesitation when he faced her with the answer. Spike was confused. A human hadn’t managed to truly surprise him in far too many years. He had had no occupation for his lonely days and lonelier nights since losing his beloved Dru to Angelus. This girl had proven a welcome distraction even during that first awkward blowjob. Now she was proving to be something more. A true challenge. He was looking forward to it. She had, to use a hackneyed phrase, unsuspected depths. He wanted to explore them. He wanted to break her apart until there was not a single corner or her mind or her soul (not to mention her surprisingly desirable body) that he had not penetrated. He wanted to understand her, to see where she found her strength and resolve and then he wanted to tear it apart until she was totally and completely vulnerable to him, just as a pet should be.

Angelus (curses on him) had been right. The girl was special. He’d have to take good care of this one. He wanted to keep her around for a while. Spike looked down at her again. She lay on the hard floor, peacefully unconscious with the lines of pain and resolution smoothed out of her face. Once again, she looked innocent and vulnerable and unendingly fragile. He smiled down at her. In an uncharacteristically gentle gesture, he softly stroked her hair, pushing it away from her face to allow his fingers to drift lightly over her skin. The tip of his index finger traced over the outline of her lips. He wondered how they would taste, pressed against his own, parted with his tongue. He felt a rush of lust wash over him.

He started to reach for one of her open cuts. The punishment was finished now; he could finally taste her blood. But he caught himself just before dipping his finger into the wound. When he tasted her blood, he wouldn’t lick at cuts like some kind of scavenger. He’d feed off her lovely neck, leaving his mark in plain sight. And she’d be awake. Yes, he definitely wanted her awake and aware when he made his claim on her. He sighed as he pulled his hand away. As tempting as her blood was, it would have to wait for now. He yelled for a minion to bring him water and a washcloth and some bandages. He’d clean her up, bandage her up and put her to bed, and when she woke, the games would begin again.

~Part: 15~

Angelus, as always, arrived just in time. The sewers had a manhole hidden in a shadowy corner near the back entrance to the mansion. It allowed Angelus to slip silently in through the glassed-in doors, and he was just in time to hear Spike yell for a minion. Apparently, Willow’s punishment had just been completed and Spike wanted a bowl of water, a washcloth, and some bandages to tidy her up. Spike had always had the habit of bandaging up his pets after beating them. All in all, it wasn’t a bad habit to have. The pets were always grateful for it, not realizing the practicality behind the action. If the pets got sick and weak from infections, they were less capable of pleasing their master, not to mention far less likely to survive their training. Besides, as badly damaged as they were by the time Spike was through with them, they’d be all too likely to drip blood on the furniture and the bedsheets for days to come if the wounds were not properly treated. Angelus was fastidious about such things. So normally, he would have approved of Spike’s command. But in this case, if Willow was cleaned and bandaged, it would ruin Angelus’ plans for the afternoon, and Angelus never allowed anything or anyone to ruin his plans.

Therefore, Angelus announced his return to the mansion by grabbing the designated minion by the back of his collar as he scurried by and countermanding Spike’s order in a voice loud enough for Spike to hear and understand. He wanted to make sure that Spike did nothing to remove so much as a drop of blood from the girl’s body. He had plans for her blood. And her body. When he was satisfied that he had made his intentions clear, he ran up the steps and into the master bedroom.

Drusilla was precisely where he had left her: naked and in his bed, waiting for him. She let out a squeal of delight when Angelus came bursting into the room and reached out her arms to welcome him back to bed. Moments later, she let them drop in her shock and confusion when he brushed past the bed without so much as a glance in her direction. Instead, he headed directly over to the bedside table and began rummaging through the contents of the drawer. He did not seem to even notice that Drusilla was in the room. Or maybe he simply didn’t care. If he had looked, he would have seen that she made quite a lovely picture on the bed with her pale skin and dark hair contrasting beautifully against his burgundy silk sheets, but his eyes did not so much as stray her way even as she slid the sheet off her body, trying to draw his attention.

Drusilla rose to her knees and crawled over the bed to him, reaching for him, trying to pull him into bed with her. Casually, almost absentmindedly, he backhanded her away from him, still without looking up. He didn’t hit her very hard; he wasn’t interested in damaging her, he simply brushed her off, just as you might swat at a fly; but the movement was so unexpected that it was enough to knock her off of the bed. She landed with a thump on the floor and lay there, unmoving, in shock. She wasn’t surprised that he hit her; he hit her all the time. Most of the time, she liked it. It was his own particular brand of foreplay and both Angelus and Drusilla enjoyed mingling pain with their pleasure. What surprised her was that after hitting her, he proceeded to ignore her completely. That was definitely unusual, and more than a little troubling. Usually after he hit her, he’d join her, hit her some more, and pretend to force her to the bed. She’d play the reluctant virgin slowly but inescapably seduced into his arms. He liked that game. But he seemed interested in another game at the moment. One that didn’t appear to involve his princess at all.

Crossing her arms over her chest, she began pouting. The pout always served to draw Spike’s complete attention, which led immediately to him apologizing endlessly for upsetting his princess, and promising her special treats to make it up to her. Angelus still didn’t notice. She started to whimper. The whimper would have Spike on his knees, begging her to smile for him again, and promising her anything she wanted to make her happy. Angelus, finally finding what he wanted, gathered his supplies out of the drawer and headed through the bedroom door, without giving her so much as a backward glance.

Drusilla’s jaw dropped as she forgot to whimper and pout. Her jaw shut with a snap as she heard him loudly descending the stairs and realized that he truly wasn’t planning on coming back. A confused look filled her face as she slipped back between the sheets, trying to figure out why her Daddy didn’t want to play with her anymore. Had she done something wrong? Or was this a new kind of game? With a sigh, she pulled the sheet over her body and settled her cheek into the pillow. She needed her sleep. Mother always said that a girl needed her beauty rest. When she woke up, she’d ask Miss Edith. Her dolly would know what to do.

Meanwhile, Angelus reached the first floor and barged into Spike’s room, without knocking. Spike looked at Angelus and then dropped his eyes to see what he held in his hand. Spike had followed Angelus’ instructions and had left Willow untouched on the floor. He was a little curious as to what the elder vampire had in mind. As he saw what Angelus held, Spike’s expression hardened. <Why can’t the bastard find his own toys to play with?> Spike thought to himself. After all the years with the wanker, he knew what was coming now. It was one of Angelus’ favorite ways to pass the time and he had been known to stretch this activity out for hours.

Spike wasn’t really surprised; Angelus was easily bored and always found great amusement in playing with other people’s possessions. However, Spike was a little disappointed. He had actually been looking forward to finally spending some real quality time with his pet when she woke up. Thus far, she was proving more intriguing by the minute. He wanted to find out more about her, understand her mind and the way she operated. Spike loved puzzles (how else could he put up with a madwoman like Dru?) and this girl was the most intriguing puzzle he had seen in a long time. He had planned several ways in which they could become better acquainted, possibly including teaching her a few more tricks on how to please her master. One of the more pleasant proofs of the enigma of her mind was how quickly she learned.

But now his plans were spoilt. Angelus was master of the house, and had always enjoyed playing his role to the hilt, particularly when it came to Spike. There were specific, unbreakable rules about training a pet which prevented Angelus from simply taking the girl and doing whatever he pleased with her, but if Angelus wanted to amuse himself with Spike’s pet for the afternoon without actually breaking any of the rules, then any other plans Spike might have had were forced to the side.

Angelus smirked at the annoyance clearly written on Spike’s face, but chose not to comment on it.

“Put her on the bed,” he commanded. “You know how to position her.”

“It’ll get blood all over the sheets,” Spike grumbled, under his breath.

“What was that, *William*?” Angelus asked, deliberately emphasizing Spike’s detested human name.

Spike’s jaw tensed as he bit back the remark he so desperately wanted to make. With visible effort, he restrained himself. “Nothing, Angelus,” he answered. “I didn’t say a thing. You must be going senile in your old age.”

Angelus merely smiled in response, settling himself into a chair and preparing himself for the task at hand. He watched as Spike gently lifted Willow into his arms, placing her on the bed and gently arranging her body into the first position, on her side. He turned to face Angelus with his eyebrows raised, looking to see if the girl was arranged to his approval. Angelus nodded and Spike wheeled away to a corner where he pulled out a cigarette and his lighter, smoking petulantly as he watched Angelus start to work on his pet. Angelus settled himself and his tools in the chair, and began.

Angelus angled the charcoal in his hand, making the first outlines on the paper as he sketched Willow’s lovely form. He wanted Buffy to have a personalized memento of Willow’s morning of torture and what better souvenir than a sketch showing her battered state, sprinkled, perhaps, with her blood? Besides, from the moment Angelus saw the girl nude and bloody that morning, his fingers had inched for his sketching materials. One sketch would go to Buffy. But the rest would be for himself. This was an image that he wanted to treasure.

He stood from the chair, moving over to where she lay on the bed. Gently, he rearranged the spread of her hair on the pillow and re-angled her body slightly, tilting it to reflect more light. His hands stroked her skin as he shifted her position. Finally, he pulled his hands away from her. He was surprisingly reluctant to stop touching her; her body felt so warm and soft and yielding under his hands. He had been very tempted to explore it further, but he forced down the urge. There would be time for that later.

Angelus did not even notice his change of attitude. Just the previous night, he had given Willow to Spike, convinced that the girl was good enough for Spike but was not up to the challenge of pleasuring the true master of the house. Now, after seeing some of the fire as well as the beauty that she had hidden from him for so long, his mind was calculating not *if* he would eventually take the girl to his bed, but *when*. He did not want her for his pet; he still assumed that she had nothing to offer that could hold his interest for more than a few hours, but he no longer dismissed her entirely. She would belong to Spike and Spike would have the chore of training her and seeing to her, but Angelus would experience her, enjoy her, and allow her the privilege of pleasing him, someday soon. Yes, he thought, as he gave her velvety skin a final caress. Someday soon. But not today. There were other games that needed to be played today.

Angelus discovered that his actions had left his fingers covered in her blood. With a smirk, he raised his fingers to his lips to lick them clean. He had tasted a bit of her blood from her lip the night before, but that hadn’t prepared him for the pure ambrosia he sampled now. The blood that came from her wounds was thicker, stronger, and heavily flavored with fear and pain, two of his favorite seasonings. Mixed in with them were the base seasonings of sweetness from innocence begging to be corrupted, the spice of intelligence, and even a tang of potential magic mixed with a flavor that was indescribably Willow. It was intoxicating and his eyes closed as he purred with pleasure, sucking his fingers slowly to prolong the delicious experience.

He was so focused on his own pleasure that he did not notice the faint growling noise coming from the shadows along with a curling wisp of cigarette smoke. Spike was not pleased. As if it wasn’t bad enough that Angelus was ruining his afternoon by monopolizing his pet, the bastard had had the nerve to taste her. And from the looks of it, he was enjoying it very much. Too much. Spike’s pet should be bringing that level of pleasure to no one but her master. Spike’s annoyance was increased by the fact that he, her master, had yet to taste his pet’s obviously potent blood. He had been waiting, determined that the first time he fed from her would be something special, a memorable event for the both of them. And now Angelus was cheapening it by getting there first. Angelus always got there first.

Spike continued to clench his jaw and smoke compulsively as he glared at Angelus from his shadowy corner of the room. Angelus did not so much as glance his way. He returned to his sketch, his eyes glued to Willow. Spike eyed the number of charcoals Angelus had brought down with him and the size of the stack of drawing paper. It would appear that he planned to be there, sketching, for quite some time. Most likely, he intended it to be his activity of the afternoon. Spike knew how Angelus got when he found a new subject for his thrice-damned sketches. Spike grumbled quietly to himself as Angelus continued to sketch and Willow continued to sleep on, peaceful and happy in the oblivion of her dreamworld. She was safe there. For the time being.

~Part: 16~

Within a few hours, Angelus had completed a pile of sketches of Willow from his position in the light next to the bed and Spike had smoked through a pack and a half of cigarettes from his dark corner of the room. It’s a pity that Spike, himself, was not an artist. The contrast of Angel: huge, dark and dangerous and Willow: tiny and glowing with innocence and fragility, made quite a striking tableau. But Spike was no artist. His reaction to the image in front of him was not aesthetic appreciation, but a burning desire to rip Angelus’ head off and spit down his severed neck. In lieu of that, he merely smoked, compulsively. The silence was only broken by the scratch of the charcoal pencils on the paper and the occasional rasp of the lighter igniting another cigarette. Neither of them spoke. Willow continued to sleep, the relaxed expression on her face hinting at pleasant dreams.

Angelus was pleased with his sketches. He had shaded the charcoal with Willow’s blood, perfecting the technique in one especially gory sketch that he planned to give to Buffy. Every bruise and cut that covered her lovely skin was clearly delineated. He didn’t want Buffy to miss a single detail of the torture that Willow had undergone and silently congratulated his childe on being so thorough. But once the sketch for Buffy was completed, the drawings took on a much different tone. The focus shifted from the injuries covering the girl to the girl herself, startlingly beautiful with her red hair, red blood and white skin against the perfect backdrop of the black silk sheets that covered Spike’s bed. She looked like a martyred saint, or maybe a tortured angel, awaiting her inevitable destruction with calm resignation.

He took every opportunity to reposition Willow, enjoying the feel of her warm, supple, exquisitely soft flesh beneath his hands and the repeated occasion to lick away some more of her blood from his fingers. Spike growled each time, but the sheer volume of Angelus’ purrs of pleasure drowned out the sound. She seemed to taste better every time and the intervals between the different positions grew shorter and shorter as he invented new reasons to touch her and taste her. But despite his skill at arranging her body to suit his preference, he knew that a vital element was missing.

He wanted Willow awake. He wanted pictures showing those startling eyes of hers and the way they looked when she was looking at him. He wanted a stack of pictures where he could sketch not merely her face but her expression as well. She had always had an enormously expressive face. He had never really noticed it himself; when Buffy was in the room, the slayer was all that his souled self could see; but Buffy had commented on it several times. She had said that you could read each one of Willow’s thoughts as her expressions changed. He was more than a little curious to see what her face would express now.

He shouted for a minion to bring him some smelling salts. He knew she needed her rest to recover from the strain of the events of the past twenty-four hours, but the thought didn’t concern him much. He’d only require her attention for a few more hours and then Spike could take care of her, if he felt the need to do so. If the pain grew unbearable for Willow, maybe he could get some nice sketches of her screaming in agony. He could give one of those to Buffy, too.

The minion entered with the smelling salts. Angelus took them from him and sent the minion away. Angelus seated himself at the edge of the bed, and then swung his legs up so that he was lying next to Willow. For the latest series of pictures, he had propped up her upper body on a stack of pillows and sketched her in profile. Angelus placed his head next to hers on the pillow. She had a scratch on her face, just below her cheekbone. Like all the other cuts on her body, it was shallow, but still deep enough to draw blood. This time, instead of licking her blood off of his fingers, he tilted his head over and licked it directly off her cheek. In the hour since her torture had ceased, some of the blood, especially on smaller cuts such as this one, had had a chance to clot. But once he began licking at it, the wound reopened and fresh blood hit his lips. His eyes closed as waves of pleasure crashed over him. The taste of her blood mingled with the flavor of her warm, sweet skin made him oblivious to everything else. He suckled on the cut until the blood stopped flowing, unaware of the seething vampire seated in the corner who was gripping the arms of his wheelchair until his knuckles turned white.

Angelus was very tempted to bite into that lovely neck and taste Willow properly, but even he did not dare. Willow belonged to Spike. She was his pet. His mark had to be the first one. Until her training was over, no one would be permitted to draw her blood but him. Angelus had no scruples about enjoying the blood already on her skin; after all, Spike was the one who spilled it; but biting her would take the game too far. With a groan of disappointment, Angelus removed his lips from the cut and raised the smelling salts to her nose.

“Wake up, Sleeping Beauty,” he whispered to Willow, smiling as he nuzzled her neck. “Time to wake up.”

Willow was dreaming of the time Xander’s favorite uncle came to visit and took them out fishing. They had been ten years old and Willow’s crush on Xander had just begun to take hold. They had rented a small boat and brought a cooler with drinks and sandwiches for lunch. Willow hadn’t wanted to fish (she didn’t like the idea of catching animals to eat them) so while Xander and Uncle Max sat with their fishing rods, she had stretched out in her bathing suit with her eyes closed, soaking in the sun. They had stayed silent so they wouldn’t spook the fish. They didn’t catch a thing all afternoon, she had gotten a horrible sunburn, and the sandwiches were ruined when the cooler water soaked through the bread (Xander had been in charge of them and hadn’t realized it was a bad idea to leave them loosely wrapped in the middle of a mound of slowly melting ice) but it had been one of the best days of her life. She had been able to spend the day quiet and peaceful with no responsibilities, just lying in the sun, surrounded by people she loved and trusted who she knew would take care of her. Every now and then she’d reach out and touch Xander, just to prove to herself that it was real, and he’d turn and give her that smile that made her feel so warm and shaky inside. He’d squeeze her hand and she’d squeeze his back and smile at him, and close her eyes again.

That dream was her safe place. Whenever she felt scared or lonely or upset, whenever her mother asked her if she was really working up to her potential when she got a 95 instead of a 100 on a test that most of the class failed, whenever her father forgot her age or even her name when introducing her to colleagues who came over to the house, whenever Cordelia ridiculed her, or Xander raved to her about yet another girl, or, more recently, whenever she narrowly escaped being dinner (or breakfast, or lunch, or all three at once) for some vampire, she’d go to sleep wrapping herself in the comfort of this dream. It always made her feel better, safer, relaxed and contented. She never wanted to leave it. But she didn’t have a choice. A sharp, unpleasant scent filled her nose. She tried to turn her head away, but the smell seemed to follow her, forcing her out of her peaceful oblivion. Reluctantly, she opened her eyes.

Her initial instinct was to look up and see who was holding the smelling salts to her nose. Although she had never fainted before, she instantly recognized the smelling salts for what they were. But as soon as she opened her eyes, she saw the wisp of cigarette smoke coming from the corner of the room. Spike. Her eyes immediately began searching the darkness for him. Whoever was holding the smelling salts didn’t matter. She knew the rules. The only person she needed to concern herself with was Spike. Her expression grew frantic when she couldn’t spot him. She knew he was there, hidden by the shadows. She wouldn’t be able to relax until she made eye contact with him. She had to know that her punishment was over; <Please, God, let the punishment be over. I don’t think I can take any more> she thought; but she knew quite well that he was the only one who could make that decision.

She heard a low-pitched chuckle fill the silence of the room and visibly relaxed as Spike wheeled himself out of the darkness into the light. He was the one chuckling, and she could tell from the grin on his face and the pleased glint in his eye that he was in a good mood. She didn’t know what she had done to make him happy, but she certainly wasn’t going to argue with results. She let out a breath she hadn’t realized she was holding. The punishment, for the time being, was over.

“Looking for me, pet?” he murmured gently to her as he wheeled himself up to the foot of the bed.

“Always, master,” she answered, quietly but calmly with the unmistakable ring of honesty in her voice.

“Good pet,” he said, his smile growing larger. “Don’t you think she’s a good pet, Angelus?” Spike asked, turning his head to look at Angelus, his amusement clearly written all over his face.

It was Angelus’ expression that has caused him to laugh in the first place. When Willow opened her eyes only to immediately search for her master without so much as a glance at Angelus, the dark vampire’s jaw had literally dropped with shock. Spike did not even attempt to disguise his satisfaction. Angelus was too absorbed in staring at Willow to notice and take offense. Spike couldn’t remember the last time he had seen Angelus so completely startled. Willow’s simple, almost instinctive action to look for Spike before acknowledging anyone else in the room (and its incomparable results of completely discomfiting Angelus) had cleared away every lingering trace of Spike’s former bad mood as if by magic.

“Yes,” Angelus answered curtly. “She’s a very good pet.” His expression had slowly changed from shock to annoyance. Even when Spike asked him a question, even when he replied, showing himself to be right next to Willow, lying beside her on the bed, she still kept her eyes fixed solely and directly on Spike. What had Spike done to the girl, brainwashed her? It wasn’t natural. Women always looked at Angelus. What made this girl so different? Angelus sat up, positioning himself so that he was seated at the on the edge of the bed, facing Willow. She continued to keep her eyes on Spike, innocently oblivious to Angelus’ growing frustration.

“Tell her to look at me,” he commanded.

Spike’s smirk grew larger. “Pet?” he said, lazily.

“Yes, Master?”

“Look at Angelus.”

“Yes, Master,” Willow answered obediently and turned to face Angelus. She flinched as the movement reminded her of the pain and stiffness that filled her entire body. Not that it was possible to forget, considering that she was one, large, bleeding injury from head to toe, but all movement intensified her agony. Angelus watched her as she clenched her jaw to hold back an exclamation of pain but her eyes, as they stared into his, showed nothing of her struggle. They held, instead, quiet determination.

Willow noticed that Angelus seemed angry about something. Frustration and annoyance were clearly written on his face. Normally, that wouldn’t have bothered her. She had seen Angel angry and frustrated before: usually when he suspected that Buffy was involved with some other guy. He’d vent and then he’d feel better. But this was different, and not just because he lacked the restraint of the soul. This time, his anger, his frustrations, all his emotions, and all his energy were focused directly on her. He stared at her with an intensity that seemed to burn into her skin. She wanted to look away, back away, escape the white-hot concentration of his gaze, but she forced herself to remain still. Spike had told her to look at Angelus. Spike would be displeased if she looked away. With her body aching from every possible point and unbearable strains on muscles she had not realized she even possessed, the last thing she wanted to do was displease Spike.

“You will continue looking at him until I tell you not to, and you will do whatever he asks, do you understand?”

“Yes, master.”

Spike smirked again at Angelus. “She’s all yours, mate,” he said, lighting up yet another cigarette and inhaling it with a smile of pure satisfaction.

~Part: 17~

Angelus forced himself to take several deep breaths. Even after two and a half centuries of not breathing, he hadn’t gotten over the habit of using deep breaths to relax himself. He was never one to argue with results, and deep breaths always managed to help him focus and relax, especially when he needed to calm his temper, and his demon. His fangs were itching to drop and his demon was screaming to come forward and prove his dominance by show of force. It was tempting. It was *more* than tempting, it was almost irresistible, but Angelus knew what a mistake that would be. Now was not the time to lose his infamous cool. He didn’t want to scare Willow. That’s not what this was about. What he truly wanted, he reminded himself, was to seduce her.

He hadn’t expected to find her so intriguing. In the year and a half that he had known her, neither the soul nor the demon had ever thought to give her a second glance. Angel and Angelus who disagreed on every topic under the sun (and the moon, as well) would have found themselves agreeing in their description and perception of Willow. She was shy, quiet, bookish and bland; exceptional only in her overwhelming innocent and inexperience, like a million other socially backward sixteen-year-old girls. While she was unquestionably brighter than most, there was nothing other than that to distinguish her from the faceless mass of the world’s supply of wallflowers. That was the whole reason why he had given her to Spike instead of keeping her for himself. She would be sufficient to keep Spike amused for a little while without being strong or interesting enough to pose any kind of threat to his household.

But somehow, after a year and a half of completely escaping his notice, she had managed to capture the whole of his attention after living under the same roof with him for less than twenty-four hours. She puzzled him. It was an unfamiliar sensation. He couldn’t remember the last time someone had so completely bewildered him. He didn’t like being puzzled. Over his two and a half centuries on earth, both with and without a soul, Angelus had gotten very good at manipulating people. This had given Angelus something of a contemptuous view of society. He saw people as transparent and utterly predictable. Everyone had their weakness or their price and Angelus was an expert at finding both. He believed that no person existed whom he could not control as he saw fit. There was not a man on earth he could not intimidate. There was not a woman on earth he could not seduce. People were amusing playthings to pass the eternity of time that he had at his disposal and breaking them provided him with his favorite source of entertainment. The men provided him with some occupation for his mind, and the women (along with the occasional man) provided him with some warmth and pleasure in his bed.

Of course, Angelus knew that not all women were worth seducing. Sex was only valuable so far as it was useful as a means to control someone. After all, he had only one goal in every aspect of his unlife: domination. He used sex as a weapon toward that end. Sexual activity was not performed for emotional fulfillment or even physical satisfaction but to show his ability to seduce and dominate whomever he chose. That’s why he had such fun fucking Dru even though she was such a lousy lay. He liked to prove his domination over her, and, through her, over Spike. He had loved fucking Darla, making his sire, his creator, beg for more, beg for him, beg for the fulfillment only he could provide. He loved it when they begged.

Re-breaking his family was fun, but it lacked the thrill of a fresh target. And so, wherever he went, he had made an absolute science of finding whoever had the strength to oppose him and either seducing them or destroying them, or (his favorite) seducing them in order to destroy them. Although he knew he could have anyone that he wanted, he decided that no one but the strongest opponent was worth his time or energy.

After a century of being caged, Angelus was aching to stretch his wings and return to the pursuit of his favorite sport. He had targeted the slayer as his main enemy. She was strong, smart, and unpredictable. She’d be fun to break. Besides, she’d be a fine example to the rest of the demon community. His blasted soul’s love for her had turned his name into a joke. Angelus would tear her apart and rebuild his reputation on her broken body. Since Angel had already seduced her (much to Angelus’ disgust), all Angelus had to do was destroy her. When he was done with that, he’d head back to Europe and set the civilized world on fire, again. There was nothing to hold him to Sunnydale. The slayer was the only challenge the wretched hellhole held. He had dismissed everyone else as unworthy of his attention. Her friends, her family, and her watcher were all mere pawns: insignificant bits of nothing that he would manipulate solely in order to hurt the slayer. In and of themselves, they did not matter.

Willow was throwing off his careful calculations. He had been so cocksure and confident when he dismissed her as no real threat, but every second he spent with her demonstrated how sorely he had underestimated her. She was showing a degree of strength that she wasn’t supposed to possess. His immediate reaction to such a demonstration of ability was to use her natural attraction to him to break her, to seduce her into adoring submission, as he had done so many times before. Here again, she surprised him. She did not so much as glance his way, unless instructed to do so. It hurt Angelus’ pride. How could she not want him? *Everyone* wanted him. Some wanted to have him, others wanted to *be* him, several wanted to destroy him and a few were content just to worship him, but he had never come across anyone who didn’t want him. It piqued his curiosity. If Willow was not to be so easily seduced just by his presence, then what would it take entice her? Would she respond to the highly sensual activity of being sketched by him? Would she melt under his concentrated stare, as so many women had before? Would his touch as he positioned her cause her to shiver?

He forced her attention on to him and waited for her to cave. The Willow Angel had known couldn’t hold eye contact with a man for more than a few seconds without looking away, stammering, and blushing. But Willow wasn’t doing that now. Her wide green eyes were staring into his, unwaveringly, as instructed. She didn’t blush, she didn’t stammer excuses, and she didn’t look away. Her gaze was calm and steady and the expression in her eyes showed pain, fear, and disciplined resignation. It aggravated him. It wasn’t that he minded the pain and fear; they were, in fact, two of his favorite expressions. But the resignation bothered him. He didn’t want her resigned. He didn’t want her to tolerate him, he wanted her to *want* him. He wanted her to look at him with her eyes full of lust and admiration. That was what he expected from women. If she looked at him like that, he could relax. He’d stop wondering what mystery was spinning in that head of hers. He’d stop finding her so unaccountably perplexing and intriguing. If she began behaving predictably again, he’d stop thinking about her, wondering about her. He was sure of it.

He maintained constant eye contact with Willow this entire time. She watched as the tension in his jaw slowly faded and his eyes went from flashing to their normal, smoldering state. A slow, lazy grin blossomed on his face as he relaxed under the influence of his internal pep talk. This wouldn’t be difficult. Of course it wouldn’t be difficult. It was just Willow. Sweet, innocent, naïve, easily influenced Willow. He’d seduce her in no time at all and bring her to the point where she couldn’t bear to take her eyes off him. And he’d see if Spike would be able laugh then, when his pet fell head over heels for Angelus, just as all the others had before. There was nothing special about this girl. At the end of the day, she was just like everyone else and she would adore him, just as they all had before. It was just taking her a little longer to get there.

Meanwhile, Willow was getting seriously annoyed. Years of tutoring jocks, not to mention being friends with Xander and Buffy had given her an enormous stock of patience and a temper that could hold up against almost anything but there is only so much a human can be expected to bear. She was tired. She was hungry. She was thirsty. She was in a hellish amount of pain. She was scared nearly out of her wits. Hidden under all of that was embarrassment over being naked and exposed in front of Spike and Angelus. At the moment, it wasn’t really bothering her; there was too much on her mind; but she knew instinctively that if the other problems melted away, she’d have the energy to let it bother her *a lot*.

And now Angelus was staring at her. Without saying a word. For nearly five minutes now. It was driving her crazy. She hated being stared at. It was taking all her self-control not to turn away, pull away, leave the room if she could. But she knew that she couldn’t. So she held herself rigidly together, forcing herself to show nothing but compliance. The strain was quickly sapping what remained of her energy.

Spike watched the two of them with open amusement. The meek little redhead was staring Angelus down. He knew she was weak and exhausted and probably hurting pretty badly from her discipline before, but she maintained her composure and refused to break. With each moment that passed, he grew more and more pleased with his pet. *His* pet. That firebrand belonged to him. When Angelus left, he could return to his bed and claim that fire, direct it in any way that he chose. He grew aroused at the very thought. His princess might belong to her sire, but his pet belonged to no one but him. He felt a tiny burst of pride as he watched her maintain her discipline as the tension-filled silence dragged out and found himself silently rooting for her. <That’s it, Red, make him work for it. Fight back, pet. Show him that it takes more than a smirk paired with bedroom eyes to entice a woman of spirit.>

Willow’s patience was reaching the breaking point. She was moments away from yelling at Angelus. She hated the thought of giving in and showing emotion, but she was reaching her limit and could feel the approaching hysteria. Fortunately, it didn’t come to that. Right as she felt the last restraints on her control and temper beginning to snap, Angelus began to smile. The grin was slow, lazy and completely self-satisfied. Whatever conclusions he had reached, he was obviously pleased with them. Willow felt her stomach lurch. When Angelus was pleased, Scoobies ran in fear.

“Willow,” he purred, “I’ve decided to allow you to entertain me for the afternoon.”

Willow definitely did not like the sound of that. All the color drained out of her face as she thought of the variety ways he might choose to be entertained. Knowing Angelus, it could truly be anything. Was he planning to rape her? beat her! feed off of her!! or… (her eyes drifted down to his hands where she saw the charcoal pencil and the sketchbook)… draw her?

“Wiiillllllooooow,” Angelus purred, “you’re not paying attention to me.”

Her eyes snapped back to his face. A sarcastic retort was on the tip of her tongue, but she bit it back, literally, until she felt her tongue begin to bleed. Maybe if she kept her mouth shut, he’d leave soon. She had never held his attention for long before. There was no reason to believe that she’d hold it for long now.

“That’s not very nice,” Angelus pouted. “I think you owe me an apology.”

Willow resisted the urge to roll her eyes. Why was he talking to her like this? If there was something he wanted her to do or say, she wished he’d spit it out already. Thank heavens Spike was more straightforward. This whole act was tiring.

“I apologize, Angelus,” she recited politely and emotionlessly.

“Don’t worry, sweet Willow,” he murmured, stepping forward and running his tongue slowly and deliberately over his lips. “I’ll find a way for you to make it up to me.” He ran a single finger over her body, gently grazing over her skin as he traced tiny, lazy circles in a trail from her collarbone down between her breasts then over to circle her hipbone. He expected her to blush and tremble under his touch. She didn’t. Her jaw tensed but other than that, she gave no response. Determined to force a response out of her, he lowered the heel of his hand so that it was no longer his finger but the whole of his hand with his fingers spread wide that pressed against her hipbone. Adding more weight to his hand, he pressed it against her belly as he dragged it across to the other hipbone and then down, ever so slowly, against her inner thigh. He squeezed it gently.

Willow held in tears of rage and humiliation. Though the nature of his touch was highly erotic, it didn’t arouse her in the slightest. It just made her feel sick. She knew he didn’t desire her. He was most likely turning this into some kind of sick power play: a weapon that he could later use against Buffy. She was just an object to him and the idea revolted her. His touch was translating into the most degrading experience of her life. She wanted to push his hand away in disgust. She wanted to throw up. She wanted to spend the next few hours in a shower, trying to wash herself clean of this entire nightmare that had become her life.

But that wasn’t an option. She had to obey Angelus for the afternoon and she had to obey Spike indefinitely, so she knew she had no choice but to sit still and wait for him to grow bored with her. It was bound to happen soon. She just had to be patient. So she clenched her jaw until her teeth started to hurt (which might not have been the best idea since her teeth had been the only parts of her body that weren’t already sore) and kept her mouth shut, holding herself rigidly to prevent any physical response. She would say whatever he told her to say, she would do whatever he told her to do. She would follow any instructions that they gave her, to the letter. AND NO MORE. She refused to give him the satisfaction of making her react.

Angelus’ smile merged into a slight frown. He didn’t mind that she was angry with him. Anger was a type of passion and he was confident that he could manipulate her anger into lust with a minimum of time and effort. But he didn’t like that she was being so quiet. He wanted her to yell at him, to let loose all that passion and fire that she was holding so carefully inside. He wanted to break her control, break her restraint, break the strenuous discipline she maintained on herself. He wanted her to lose control when it came to him. He wanted to prove to her how very weak and helpless she was and how very strong and overpowering he could be.

But she wouldn’t break.

So, what now?

Angelus’ smile returned as he contemplated his options. What now, indeed?

~Part: 18~

“Spike, my boy,” Angelus said, with his eyes still focused on Willow and his hand still gently caressing her inner thigh, “you’ve had some time to play with your pet. So tell me, what talents have you uncovered? What… skills can she use to entertain me?”

“Well, she gives one hell of a blowjob but I don’t think even you would have an easy time sketching her portrait while she gives you head,” Spike replied. He took another drag off his cigarette and a wicked smile crossed his face as another thought occurred to him. “Even though that would make one hell of a nice picture to give the slayer.”

Angelus smirked at the suggestion, mentally tucking it away for later use.

“We’ll have to try that,” he murmured to Willow, lifting his hand from her thigh to gently stroke her hair, tucking the long strands back out of her face with his fingers while his thumb gently caressed her cheek, “some other time.” His thumb slid down her cheek to her mouth and his traced his thumb over the crease of her lips, back and forth, over and over again.

“Open your mouth, Willow,” he whispered to her. It took her a few moments to obey. Her jaw was clenched so tightly shut, it took several deep breaths before she was able to sufficiently relax it. With one final sigh, her lips parted beneath his questing thumb, which quickly slipped inside the warm, wet cavern of her mouth and began stroking in and out, back and forth, raping her mouth with his touch.

For the first time, it occurred to Willow that she was lucky she had had nothing to eat in so many hours. If Angelus had done this to her when she had a full stomach, she had no doubt she would have thrown up. Spike’s cock in her mouth had been less intimate than this. The blowjobs she had given him had been solely to relieve Spike’s tension, to pleasure him precisely as she was commanded. It had been impersonal almost to the point of being businesslike. She could handle that. She didn’t have a problem with being the scapegoat that Spike used to relieve his aggressions because it had nothing to do with her; she was just the easy target. It wasn’t a pleasant sensation, but it wasn’t particularly degrading, either. He didn’t turn it into something for her to be ashamed of.

What Angelus was doing to her now was a deliberate, personalized act of violation. He wasn’t doing this to release his own tensions or to give himself pleasure. He did this solely to humiliate and dominate her. His obvious satisfaction came not from the act but from forcing her to perform it. She would have preferred giving him a blowjob. She knew that he would have made that humiliating as well, but at least then she wouldn’t have had to look at his face. He had arranged the two of them so that she would be forced to look at him in the eye while pleasuring him. She had no choice but to look at the features that she still remembered as Angel, the love of her best friend’s life, and watch his satisfaction as he raped not only her mouth but her memories as well and demonstrated how even the most insignificant parts of him could dominate her completely. She was, well and truly, under his thumb.

“Suck on it, Willow,” he whispered, his voice growing softer, more intimate with every word. “Show me how good you are with that mouth of yours.” Willow’s instinct once again was to clench her jaw to hold back the curses that lay on the tip of her tongue, but that was no longer an option. She didn’t even want to think what would happen if she accidentally bit him. She didn’t know which would be worse: if he got angry and punished her violently, or if he enjoyed it. She didn’t want to find out, so she settled for a few deep breaths again, to relax her to the point where she could obey.

She knew she had to continue looking at him. That was the hardest part. She hated looking into his eyes and seeing his lust, his pleasure, and, worst of all, his amusement at the situation he had placed her in. So instead, she focused on the tip of his nose. She could do this, she told herself. She could handle this. All she had to do was stare fixedly at the tip of his nose. The rest of his face blurred in her eyes as she focused her sight on that particular point. In contrast to his eyes and his lips, there was nothing Angelus could express through the tip of his nose. She started at it with newfound determination, and began sucking on his thumb.

Angelus purred in pleasure. Who would have thought that sweet little Willow had such an amazing mouth? It felt… “Use your tongue, Willow,” he commanded, oh yessss… it felt so good, so very “Mmm, yes, just like that” very good. Warm and wet and tight and *perfect* as she used her entire mouth to caress him. With his free hand, Angelus unbuttoned his fly and pulled out his cock. He’d been half hard since the moment he had tasted her blood, hours before, with the tension increasing each time he touched or tasted her. Once he felt her tongue on his thumb, he knew he couldn’t wait any longer before finding some kind of release. Keeping his thumb steady in her mouth while his fingers caressed her cheek with mocking gentleness, he used his other hand to pump his cock, matching the rhythm she set with her mouth and her tongue, while whispering soft commands to Willow on precisely how to use her tongue and where and when to graze his thumb with her teeth.

She obeyed them mechanically, continuing to focus on the end of his nose. He finally came with a moan, aiming himself so that his cum mixed with the blood on her stomach and dripped down between her thighs. The impact of the cold substance on her bare skin made her shiver, but other than that, she gave no response. He pulled his thumb out of her mouth and held his other hand up to her face with a smirk, ordering her to clean off those fingers as well. She might as well get used to the taste of his cum. With a mouth like that, she’d be swallowing gallons of it soon enough, straight from the source. But not yet. Not *quite* yet.

Once again, she obeyed, forcing herself not to spit it back out onto his face. The thought was incredibly tempting, but she knew that she couldn’t afford to make him angry now. If she didn’t get some rest soon, she wouldn’t be able to hold herself together and pissing Angelus off, particularly when he was trapped inside by the daylight hours and searching for a source of entertainment, would be somewhat less than wise. She forced herself to swallow, forced herself not to gag, forced herself to continue to stare directly at him, focusing on the tip of his nose.

Angelus pulled his fingers out of her mouth and gave her soft lips one final caress with the pad of his thumb. “Impressive,” he murmured. “Very impressive, indeed,” he repeated in a louder tone, directing his words to Spike though his eyes remained on Willow as he tucked himself back into his pants and refastened the fly. “But now that that’s done with, I need to be entertained again.”

Spike fought the urge to growl. He hated sitting on the sidelines while Angelus played with *his* pet. The rules regarding the rearing of a pet were clear cut and universally acknowledged. Once the pet’s blood was drawn, either through biting or beating, the claim was staked. After that, until the pet was finished with his or her training, he or she would perform, sexually or otherwise, only for his or her master. A proper vampire’s pet belonged solely to that one vampire, to break and train as that vampire saw fit. Any interference would ruin the training. Another vampire, even the vampire’s sire, could not interfere until the pet was officially declared fully trained.

Until Willow completed her training, any pain or pleasure that she gave or received was the exclusive property of her master, Spike. No one else could so much as touch her without his permission, as well as his supervision. Angelus had a bit of leeway, as master of the house and sire of Spike’s sire, but even his control was within certain boundaries. Angelus could play with her, but his playtime had its limits. Spike had to be there the entire time, and Angelus was not allowed to feed her, fuck her, bite her or beat her until her training was complete. Angelus knew the rules and he knew the consequences of breaking them.

Although Spike wasn’t in a position to demand retribution from Angelus, they both knew how disastrous the results would be if the rules were broken. Angelus was master of Sunnydale and, as such, had a position to maintain with all the demons in town. The Hellmouth drew a wide variety of extremely aggressive demons that had to be ruled with an iron fist. In order for Angelus’ rule to be unquestioned, his judgment had to be infallible. Every minion in the mansion knew that Angelus had personally kidnapped the girl and then handed her over to Spike. By that action, Angelus had shown that the girl didn’t interest him enough to keep her for himself. If he defied the rules of pet rearing to claim her for himself now, it would show that he had been wrong when he dismissed her before. And Angelus couldn’t allow himself to be wrong. Ever. Angelus had given Willow to Spike as Spike’s pet and Spike’s pet was what she would remain. And while Angelus had not, technically speaking, broken the rule in his little game with Willow, he was walking a fine line. Spike was fully within his rights to grumble a little.

But it was more than that. Spike saw the look in Angelus’ eye. The look remained painfully familiar to Spike, even though Angelus had not directed that look at Spike in over a century. It spoke of lust and determination. It was that look that marked Angelus’ future conquests. It meant that Angelus planned to one day have Willow where Drusilla was then: lying in his bed, waiting for him, existing only for the hope of his imminent arrival, bringing with it his touch, his passion, and his ultimate domination. For Angelus, it wasn’t a question of if and it wasn’t a question of how; it was only a question of when.

Spike had no problem with the thought that Angelus would one day bed his pet. After all, everyone enjoys a fresh partner every one in a while. As master of the house, Angelus had the right to command that every female (and every male, for that matter) to share his bed on occasion. But Spike knew that that look meant that what Angelus had chosen to have with Willow would be more than a one-day stand. Angelus wanted to possess the girl, steal away her heart and her soul until all he was all she could see or feel or think, as he had done so many times before. And once again, Spike would be left with nothing. <Why does the wanker have to take away everything that’s mine?> Spike asked himself as he smoked yet another cigarette and watched Angelus watch Willow.

“What other *skills* does she possess, Spike?” Angelus asked. “What else can she do to please me and entertain me?”

<She’s not for your pleasure or entertainment!> Spike wanted to yell. <She’s *mine* for *my* pleasure, *my* amusement. For once, you bastard, let me have something that’s mine.>

But as tempting as it was to yell that out, Spike knew better than to do anything so foolish. What Angelus wanted, Angelus got. If Spike tried to stand in the way, all he would accomplish would be to get himself mowed down. Just like old times.

<Here we go, again.> Spike thought.

~Part: 19~

“Recitation,” Spike replied.

Angelus finally turned to look at Spike, confused by his answer. “Recitation?”

“She has a photographic memory,” Spike explained. “Anything she has read or heard or seen, she can recite, verbatim.”

“Interesting,” Angelus drawled. “And how have you tested this ability?”

“I had her recite her favorite movie while I disciplined her this morning,” Spike answered.

Angelus grinned in response. “That’s my boy,” he smirked. Spike scowled. He hadn’t been Angelus’ ‘boy’ in over a century and had no intention of being his boy ever again. Angelus didn’t notice Spike’s reaction as all of his focus was directed at Willow.

“Let’s play with this for a while, shall we? Willow, recite something for me.”

“What would you like me to recite?” she asked, her voice quiet and empty of all emotion.

“It’s entirely up to you,” Angelus answered. “Surprise me.”

Willow was used to reciting. Her first grade teacher had discovered her knack for it when she was five years old, and had informed her oblivious parents, who put her talent to good use. From that point on, they had had her recite whenever they had friends over for dinner, just as some families might have shown off a dog they had taught to roll over and play dead. It had amused and impressed their friends to see such a tiny child reciting famous and difficult verses so flawlessly. Willow had hated it. It made her feel like a trained seal, and the loathing she felt for being put in the spotlight was the root of her entire case of stage fright.

As she grew older and her parents traveled more and more, the dinner parties grew increasingly rare. Besides, even at their few remaining dinner parties, her parents no longer made her recite. Apparently, watching a sixteen year old recite Milton or Shakespeare or Shelley was less impressive than watching a six year old perform the same task. But she still remembered the entire repertoire she had maintained as a child. She could recite any of those pieces. She hated them already, for the associations they had, so it’s not like this would ruin them for her. But she didn’t know which to choose. Lying on a bed beaten to shreds with blood still dripping down your skin while your vampire master and his diabolical sire “play” with you for the afternoon isn’t exactly a situation that you prepare for. What she really wanted to do was take a shower. She doubted she’d ever be able to feel fully clean. Hmm, there was an idea. A slow smile crossed Willow’s face as she decided what she would say.

“Yet here's a spot,” she said softly. “Out, damned spot! out, I say!--One: two: why, then, 'tis time to do't.--Hell is murky!”

Angelus started as he recognized the quote.

“Fie, my lord, fie!” Willow continued, the slight smile on her face growing as she took in his obvious surprise. It fit nicely with her next line, “a soldier, and afeard? What need we fear who knows it, when none can call our power to account?” <That’s for damn sure,> Willow thought to herself. Why should Angelus treat her with anything other than the mixture of contempt and amusement he had shown so far when he knew that he had all the power in the situation, and that no one could stop him?

The all-too telling words resounded in Angelus’ head. Slowly, he began to smile as well. The girl had done exactly what he told her to do. She had surprised him. The jaded, callous, unshockable Angelus who firmly believed he had seen it all before, was surprised, for what felt like the hundredth time in one day, by the same meek little slip of a girl that he had dismissed so cavalierly just the night before. Noting his smile, Willow went on with the speech, deleting the text as she went to only use the phrases that would suit her purpose.

Her eyes deliberately dropped from his face to his hand that she had just licked clean. “What, will these hands ne'er be clean?” she asked in an innocent tone. Angelus could not stop himself from laughing aloud at that. “No more o' that, my lord, no more o' that: you mar all with this starting.”

She looked down at her body, still covered in blood from the uncleaned wounds, and took a deep breath. As satisfying as it was to finally say what she wanted to say, she knew that she needed to husband her strength if she wanted to stay conscious, much less alert, for the rest of the afternoon. She settled herself back against the pillows propped behind her head and forced her body to relax into them. Her nervous tension was draining all of her energy. She’d pass out soon, at this rate. “Here's the smell of the blood still:” she stated quietly, “all the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand.” She was so horribly tired. The tension her body had held the entire time that Angelus touched her finally faded away. She didn’t have the energy to maintain it any more.

She’d cut ahead to the last line. It was the most potent, after all. Finally, Willow gathered the courage to do something she had been avoiding all afternoon. She shifted her focus away from the tip of Angelus’ nose and stared him directly in the eye as she quietly but firmly stated the last line:

“What's done cannot be undone.”

She sighed. The line might have been written for a madwoman four hundred years earlier, but it was, nonetheless, all too true. What had been done, to Angel, to Buffy and to herself, could not be undone.

“What a sigh is there! The heart is sorely charged,” Angelus replied.

Willow raised her eyebrows as she looked at Angelus. She hadn’t expected him to jump into the scene with her. She shrugged mentally. His game, his rules. If he wanted to continue, she didn’t have a problem with that. “I would not have such a heart in my bosom for the dignity of the whole body,” she answered.

“Well, well, well,” he stated, keeping in character.

“Pray God it be, sir,” Willow quoted, softly. Yes, she would pray God that all would be well. She didn’t suppose her prayers would make much of a difference. It hadn’t seemed to help the lady in question that she had quoted so glibly. But she knew she would pray, just the same. “God, God forgive us all!” she continued, more quietly still, less to Angelus than to herself. Though she continued to look in his direction, she did not seem to see him. Her eyes clouded over slightly as she lofted a quick petition to heaven. Then her eyes cleared and focused on Angelus once again.

“They exit,” she concluded.

“Bravo,” he replied, bowing his head slightly in a gesture of genuine admiration. If they had been fencing, he would have said “touché.” It was said with that intonation. “An interesting choice,” he commented.

Willow shrugged, then winced. <Note to self, no shrugging until you’ve healed.> “It seemed appropriate,” she replied.

“Appropriate, indeed,” he answered with a smirk. “‘Macbeth’ it is, then. Recite it for me. From the beginning. Lie still, keep your eyes on me, and try to keep your facial expressions consistent. I’ll be sketching you as you speak,” he explained, as he resettled himself in his chair by the bed, gathering his drawing materials back in his hands. “You may begin now,” he ordered.

Willow sighed again, and positioned herself as he had requested. She licked her dry lips and wondered if she could ask for a bottle of water. She didn’t know how she’d get through the recitation without one. Angelus looked up at her, obviously impatient for her to begin. Better not ask anything of him just yet.

“Scene one,” she began. “A desert place. Thunder and lightning. Enter three Witches. First Witch: ‘When shall we three meet again/ In thunder, lightning, or in rain?’ Second Witch: ‘When the hurlyburly's done,/ When the battle's lost and won.’ Third Witch: That will be ere the set of sun.”

Angelus smiled to himself as he began drawing. “Ere the set of sun.” Ah, how he loved ‘Macbeth’. Willow’s soft voice continued her recitation, Angelus continued his drawing, and Spike continued his smoking. Spike was annoyed and Willow was physically and emotionally drained, but Angelus was surprisingly content as he smiled at his work.

“Fair is foul, and foul is fair: Hover through the fog and filthy air.”

~Part: 20~

Drusilla was disappointed to discover when she woke up that she was just as confused as she had been when she had gone to sleep, hours before when the sun was high in the sky. The sun was low now, but her mind was clouded with questions and doubts. Daddy still wasn’t there beside her. And she still didn’t understand why. She could feel her sire’s presence in the house, downstairs with her childe, most likely in Spike’s room. As the childe of one and the sire of the other, she formed a link between the two and could feel it when they were close together. Whatever they were playing, they were apparently taking their time with it since neither of them had left Spike’s room all afternoon. She couldn’t understand why they would want to play games without their princess. They knew how much she loved playing games and Spike had always told her that everything was more pleasurable for him when he shared it with her.

She was unaccustomed to being alone. Even when she had been confined to her bed, Spike had always made sure she had minions to cater to her and keep her company when he went out to fight or hunt. The loneliness mixed in with her confusion rattled her and the voices in her head grew louder, like they were shouting in her ears. It scared her when they did that. She grabbed the pillow Angelus had used and buried her face in it, willing the scent of her sire and the memory of his touch to sooth her jangled nerves. Gradually, it worked and she felt herself relaxing as the voices in her head were lulled to their usual quiet murmur.

She opened her eyes reluctantly and started debating whether or not to get up. She could feel the sunset approaching and smiled in anticipation of the upcoming night. She liked the elegant house her Daddy had chosen for them. It was much easier to feel like a princess in a mansion as opposed to a rat-infested warehouse (although the rats made nice additions to her mid-afternoon tea. Perhaps the mansion had mice? She could only hope). But as much as she liked the house, she was eager to go outside again, to feed and prowl and dance in the moonlight. The only reason to stay in would be to play with her sire and it looked like he didn’t want to play with her just then. She had slept for hours, waiting for him to rejoin her, but her Daddy hadn’t returned.

Maybe he was waiting. He had, after all, given her a project, something he needed her to do for him. Maybe he was waiting to see how well she behaved, how well she carried out her project. She smiled at the thought. She knew she was a good girl, an obedient childe. She’d perform the task, and he’d reward her then. Halfheartedly, she sat up. She didn’t want to leave her sire’s bed when there was any chance of him returning to it to join her, but she knew she’d have to go to her room to prepare for going out. She needed to get dressed and besides, she needed to find Miss Edith. The minions had been ordered to put the doll in her room, along with her other possessions. Daddy couldn’t stand the doll and refused to allow her in his room. Daddy was sometimes silly like that.

With a sigh, she stretched (her muscles were delightfully sore from all the playing she had done with Daddy) and got up, regretfully sliding away from the soft silk sheets. The minions were too scared of her (she was old enough to be very strong and crazy enough to be highly irrational in her sudden urges to stake someone) to enter the room to clean while she was sleeping, so the room had remained untouched since the previous night. Angelus’ shirt still lay on the floor where Drusilla had wrenched it off of him in her eagerness to touch him as he pulled her into bed all those hours ago. She slid it on, buttoning it around herself. She didn’t mind walking around the mansion naked, but she wanted something that smelled like Angelus to take into her room with her. With a final sigh, she exited her sire’s room, shutting the door gently behind her. When the sun finally set, she would have to go to the store and find out what the nasty gypsy bought, like she had promised Daddy, but she wanted to talk to her dolly before she left. Miss Edith would explain away all of her confusion. Miss Edith always gave good advice.

She hummed to herself as she walked down the hall to her room. The minions had brought over all of her dresses and dolls and trinkets the night before but she had been too busy with Daddy to take any time to see how her things had been arranged. The room itself was lovely, carefully covered in the lace and frills that she loved and decorated lavishly with beautiful furniture and a soft carpet under her bare feet with images of roses, her favorite. She smiled and purred in pleasure as she dug her toes into the soft carpet. Then she frowned. Something was not right. She realized that her dolls had been lined up one by one on the windowsill of the one large window in the room. Didn’t those idiot minions realize that her dollies liked to be able to look outside? They should never be arranged with their backs to the windows. How were they supposed to see the stars like that? Of course, the windows were boarded up to block out the sunshine, but that had never stopped either Drusilla or her dolls from seeing the stars before. She made a mental note to dust the minion who arranged her room, and then went back to humming as she picked out a dress to wear.

She chose one of her least favorites. It was a designer dress that Spike had spent thousands on last time they visited Paris, shortly after leaving Prague. He had hoped it would cheer her up. But money meant very little to her and Spike’s hopes and plans rarely interested her, and she never cared much for the dress. Tonight, gypsy blood would rain in the moonlight and maybe Daddy would let her swim in it. Nasty gypsies had evil minds and evil hearts but sweet, sweet blood as she remembered from punishing them when they took her Daddy away. Yes, she’d like to swim in their blood again, and she needed to dress appropriately for the occasion. Her taller sister, the one with the blue eyes (whose name and face was hazy at best, but whose random words and comments had tangled themselves in Drusilla’s brain) had taught her that swimming in nice clothes made them nasty and messy. She didn’t want any of her really pretty dresses to get messy. Daddy would be angry.

Drusilla let her mind wander for a moment as she remembered moonlit nights and late evening swims lasting from sundown straight through until only an hour before sunrise remained, floating away in freshwater streams and saltwater oceans and sweet, red rivers of blood. There were such lovely nights, on beaches and riverbanks around the whole of the world. The stars had sung to her so beautifully and she had danced barefoot, spinning in circles in the sand and laughing in time to the music that they made. They’d have nights like that again now that Daddy was finally back. Herself and her sire and her childe and some tasty treats from town to help them pass the time. Silly boys and girls always snuck out to go for moonlight swims and the hormones in their blood gave it a lovely flavor. Darla wouldn’t be there to dominate the attention or claim the richest blood. Unlife would be perfect.

Drusilla shook herself out of her reverie at the all-too familiar sounds of angry whispering from across the room. She shook her head in dismay as she realized she had forgotten to move the dollies from the windowsill. They were angry with her for forgetting them. Quickly, she fastened herself into her dress and rushed over to rearrange the dolls. They teased her with whispers but would not speak to her, waiting for her to apologize for her neglect. She sang to them instead, teaching them the song the stars had taught her the night before. Gradually, the whispering they made in her head quieted and she and her dolls were calm, and then silent. She turned all of the dolls to face the window, as they requested, and together they named the stars. Her brown-eyed sister had taught her that the stars were always there, even if you couldn’t always see them. She always remembered that when the stars sang to her during the day.

She picked up Miss Edith and cradled the doll in her arms as she rocked her gently back and forth, back and forth. Miss Edith would always be her favorite. She stroked the doll’s soft hair, pleased with the texture of the latest batch. Since she always took such pleasure in stroking and brushing her doll’s hair, and since her vampiric strength proved to be harsher than the doll makers had planned for, Drusilla found herself accidentally pulling out Miss Edith’s hair all the time. Spike would always find a victim with the same soft, curly brown hair the doll originally possessed, and would bring her back to their lair for Dru to enjoy her blood while a minion detached her hair and glued it to the doll. This latest batch was only a few weeks old, dating back to just before Spike’s accident. Miss Edith had been very pleased with it, and had told Dru such lovely secrets in exchange, about fragile curses and lost verses, a night of sparkling beauty and perfect happiness for two shiny white souls, and an eternity of darkness and blood when the last sparkle faded and one shiny white soul returned to darkness while the other turned to despair. It had all come true. Miss Edith always told the truth.

Drusilla seated herself on the bench before the vanity table, and picked up the silver-backed hairbrush to brush Miss Edith’s hair, gently, the way Spike had showed her, so she wouldn’t hurt Miss Edith or mess up her pretty new hair. In time with the soft strokes, she told Miss Edith about her day, and her plans for the evening. Miss Edith’s voice whispered in her head, telling her more about the memory box and the dreadful puzzle it was putting together. Miss Edith told her that the memory box could lay eggs like a bird, flat eggs in hard shells that held tiny bits of thought stored inside or soft smooth eggs like black ink on white paper that held the memories the box would share. You had to crush all the eggs when you killed the bird or else it would fly away from you again. Drusilla stored the information away to tell Daddy. He would figure out what to do with it. He always did.

Drusilla was concentrating so hard on Miss Edith, she didn’t hear the other dolls as they whispered to each other on the shelves. Gwendolyn spoke quietly about red hair and fires of passion and Emily murmured warnings of the roles of pets and playmates while Gertrude whispered tales of masters and mates and Magdalene agreed with them all. But Drusilla did not hear them as she focused on Miss Edith and Miss Edith, in her own wisdom, kept her own counsel.

The sun was finally setting. Drusilla could feel it disappear. She put down Miss Edith and headed downstairs, toward Spike’s room. She could feel her sire and her childe inside. There was a guard outside, one of the larger, dumber minions whose name she was always forgetting. The sight of him reminded her that she needed to dust whoever had arranged her room. But not now, she decided. It would have to wait until later. For now, she’d visit with her Daddy and her Spike before going to the shop.

The guard stopped her at the door.

“No one is allowed inside,” he stated. He was obviously trying to sound firm and authoritative, but he looked nervous and his voice sounded hesitant at best. His nervousness increased visibly when Drusilla growled at him, but he didn’t move away from the door. All the minions were scared of Dru, but they were even more scared of Angelus and the consequences of ignoring one of his commands.

Dru could hear the murmur of voices on the other side of the door, and could tell that Spike was arguing about something with Angelus. Then she heard Angelus’ growl of annoyance just before the door jerked open to show him standing there, in vamp face, and obviously displeased.

“I thought I told you I was not to be disturbed,” he hissed at the guard at the door.

“I- I- I didn’t let her in, I mean, I d-didn’t let her d-d-disturb you,” the guard tried to defend himself. He didn’t have much of a chance. Angelus drove a stake into his heart and he disintegrated quickly, falling to the floor in apologetic-looking ashes. Angelus snapped his fingers and another minion rushed up to take his place. Only then did Angelus turn to face Drusilla.

“Drusilla, when I say that I am not to be disturbed, that includes you. Do you understand?” Drusilla whimpered but did not reply. “I asked if you understand, Drusilla, and I expect an answer.”

“Yes, sire,” she whispered.

“Good,” he replied, and seemed to relax slightly. “Go to the shop, find out the information on what the gypsy bought and then report back to me. If you find out all the information I need and come back here quickly, I might forgo your punishment.” His voice grew softer, silkier as his eyes trailed slowly down her body. “I might even reward you,” he added, huskily. “Now, go.”

The door closed back in her face before Drusilla could reply and the minion stepped silently in front of it. Drusilla stood still for a moment, trying to process what had happened. Abruptly, she turned and walked away. Her sire was so very clever. Of course she couldn’t understand him. It wasn’t her place. All she could do was obey him, and enjoy his attentions. She smiled at the memory of his promise of a reward. She’d be a good girl and maybe she’d behave so nicely that Angelus would reward her all night and day. Besides, maybe the stars would explain the mystery in their songs. As she walked toward the door, she saw the puppy she had brought back for Spike the night before. He hadn’t seemed to want it and it would make a nice snack on the way to the shop. She picked up the puppy, cradling it in her arms the way she did with Miss Edith. And then she headed out into the night.

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