SoulmatesBy Miranda
Part 1
“And your life will become very interesting over the next few days…” Willow called as the jock shambled through the opening of the tent.
Tara smiled, despite the headache she’d been nursing ever since Willow agreed to fill in for the fortuneteller for the final night of Sunnydale U’s annual carnival. The red-head looked adorable in purple peasant blouse and brightly patterned skirt, beads dangling from neck and wrists. She seemed to be enjoying herself too, her usual shyness forgotten, as she dispensed advice along with the standard fortune-telling patter.
“Lots of meanings behind interesting,” she offered from her seat behind a small table that contained some of the cheaper pieces of the Magic Box’s jewelry.
“Uh-huh. Like his is going to be interesting after his girlfriend finds out he’s been cheating. You sure you don’t want to do a reading, sweetie? I don’t feel like you’re having much fun.”
“Very sure,” Tara said emphatically. “I’m fine. We’re selling a few things.”
“How’s your head?”
“Still kind of achy,” she shrugged. “It’s nothing.”
“Achy isn’t nothing,” Willow scolded gently. Since there was a lull in the customers, she moved to stand behind Tara and gently massaged the base of her neck. Tara sighed and relaxed into the touch, closing her eyes in appreciation as Willow’s fingers slid up to circle over her sore temples.
“Don’t let me interrupt.”
Her eyes flew open, and she jerked upright at the sight of Spike smirking at them from the entrance to the tent.
“What do you want?” growled Willow, her hands dropping protectively to Tara’s shoulders.
“That any way to talk to a paying customer? I want my fortune told, of course.” His smirk broadened to a grin as he entered the tent, and a shiver ran down Tara’s spine, the throbbing in her head increasing with his words.
He tossed a couple of bills on the table and dropped into the chair. “I’m crossing your palm with silver and all that. So lets hear it, ladies. What do the fates hold in store for me?”
Willow charged around the jewelry display to confront the vampire. “The only thing the fates have for you involves a pointy stick! Get out of here!”
Spike’s face hardened. “Make me,” he snarled.
Willow turned white with fury, and the air in the tent suddenly crackled with ozone. Tara was around the table and over to the angry pair before she realized it.
“If I tell your fortune, will you go?” she asked as calmly as she could.
The other two looked surprised at her interruption. Tara couldn’t blame them: she was surprised herself or as surprised as she could manage. At the moment, it was hard to concentrate on anything other than her headache, which was assuming dizzying proportions.
“Yeah, sure,” Spike answered sullenly. "Not like I want to sit about and chat with you lot."
“You don’t have to do this,” Willow protested. Her eyes narrowed at Spike. “He’s going anyway. One way or the other.”
Tara drew her gently aside. “It isn't worth a fight. This won’t take long, and then we can close up.”
Willow nodded hesitantly, still looking troubled, and Tara sat in the fortune-teller’s chair across from Spike.
“Are you left- or right-handed?” she asked.
“Left,” he said, watching her speculatively.
“Then your right hand is the hand of your sub-conscious. Place it on the table, palm up. Think of a question, but don’t say it aloud.”
Spike obeyed slowly, looking as if he wasn’t so sure this was a good idea anymore.
He didn’t think it would happen, Tara realized as she rested her own hands, palm down, on either side of his. He thought he’d just tease us for a while and leave, not that he’d really get his fortune told. Well, too bad. We’re all in for it, now. She blinked in surprise. Where did that thought come from? This was going to be quick and painless. Her mother had taught her the basics of hand-reading, but she was no expert.
Tara took a quick grounding breath and forced herself to look at Spike’s hand as if he were just another customer. It was cone-shaped, she noted, an artist’s hand, with long, tapering fingers, the form contrasting with the black-painted nails and with what she knew of the vampire. She turned her attention to the lines.
His lifeline was different from any she’d ever seen. It curved part way down by his thumb, but instead of flowing to the base of his hand as it did in humans, the line flared off and twisted. She wondered if all vampires had that characteristic, but couldn’t think of a good way to find out. His heart line differed as well, a deep groove that scored straight across the width of his palm instead of starting at the index finger.
No wonder his plans never work out, and he comes up with crazy stuff like chaining up Buffy. He’s all emotion.
And then, before she could study further, the lines started to move, flowing and twisting across his hand like so many vines. Tara went rigid in the chair, unable to look away or speak.
“What’s the verdict, then?” Spike asked uneasily, but his voice seemed to come from a million miles away, as she sat frozen.
“Shut up, Spike,” she heard Willow say faintly. “Tara? Are you ok?”
The headache had changed, she noticed distantly. It wasn’t so much pain anymore as pressure. Pressure that drove her hand forward and closed it around Spike’s wrist.
The rush of power was like being hit by a tidal wave. Tara struggled to process what she was seeing, but the images rushed at her too fast to make sense. She thought she heard the others shouting, but she couldn’t break free of whatever had her in its grip long enough to reassure them.
There was one clear image of a young man with old-fashioned clothes and a tear-streaked face, ripping a piece of paper to shreds with a dark shape watching him in the background. The sense of danger was overwhelming, but before Tara could shout a warning, the scene changed, and she was watching a younger Buffy stand in a locker-lined hallway while Spike crept up on her. Again, she tried to call out, but there was another shift, and she was standing in a blindingly bright desert, watching a woman with wild, dark hair and a painted face use a stick to draw a pattern in the sand.
“Do you see?” the woman whispered. “Do you understand?”
She looked and tried to understand, but the pattern made no sense. There seemed to be two main lines mostly running side by side, but they broke into fragments, or other lines split off from them, and it was all a big mess. The only thing that she could get was that for all the intricacy of the pattern, the two main lines crossed each other only…
“Twice,” she said and was back in the tent, on her feet and gripping Spike’s wrist in a hold neither vampire nor witch could break. “Twice.” And she sagged unconscious into Willow’s arms.
_______________________________________
Rasputin was too a vampire, I don’t care what Professor Roberts says. Does that mean Anastasia was a Slayer or was going to be one?
The phone interrupted Buffy’s dutiful perusal of her history book and heralded Dawn’s crashing sprint through the house shouting, “I’ll get it!”
Joyce paused in the doorway of Buffy’s room, her arms full of laundry. “Didn’t we all sit down a few weeks ago and agree that Dawn could always answer the phone?”
“Yeah, but if you don’t dive on the receiver, the phone gods punish you. All calls end up being from Aunt Edna.”
“Right,” Joyce nodded. “I dimly remember what all that was like.”
Funny. Dimly is how I remember it too.
A couple of boys in her pre-Slayer boys had made her run for the phone, but that was about it. Angel had crawled through the window; Parker had called exactly three times, all before she slept with him; she had run into Riley on his campus commando raids.
Maybe I should stop thinking about this before I borrow Xander’s country music tapes.
She was returning to her notes when Dawn shouted from below, “Buffy, it’s Willow! I think something’s wrong!”
Buffy snatched up the receiver. “Will? What’s up?”
Buffy could only extract the words, “Tara” and “Spike” from the frantic burst of speech that exploded from the other end of the phone, but those were enough to get her on her feet and grabbing for weapons, the receiver jammed between her shoulder and her ear.
“Where are you?” she interrupted. “Are you at the hospital?”
“No, the dorm. Buffy, hurry!”
Joyce and Dawn were waiting for her at the foot of the stairs.
“I made Dawn hang up, but she said she thought something was wrong with Willow. Is everything all right?” Joyce asked.
Buffy shook her head. “I don’t know. Willow wasn't making much sense. I think something happened between Spike and Tara.”
Dawn crossed her arms, shoulders hunching defensively. “Did he hurt her?”
“I don’t know. I’m going to see what happened. Whatever it was can’t have been too bad because they’re at the dorm.” She made her voice calm, despite the anger which rose in response to the pain on her sister’s face. Pain that could be laid at Spike’s door.
“Stay with Mom, ok?” The last thing she needed was Dawn out in the night, especially if Spike was up to something.
“Ok,” Dawn muttered as Joyce put an arm around the younger girl’s shoulders.
“Let us know what happened,” their mother said.
“Gotcha.”
Buffy hurried through the dark streets, fury increasing with every stride.
If Spike hurt Tara, he’s going down tonight.
She shuddered at the thought of the shy woman in the vampire’s hands, shuddered at the memory of her own recent encounter with Spike as he stood above her, cold-eyed and swaggering, a smile on his reddened mouth, “See anything interesting?”
The dangers most women faced didn't really affect her. A mugger or rapist that went after the Slayer was going to be in for one hell of a surprise. But waking to find herself chained and helpless with Spike standing before her, she had known her vulnerability.
I forgot how dangerous he was even chipped. It was almost a joke, with him chained in Giles’ bathtub, and getting punched a lot. I forgot he was just biding his time.
The night he caught her, Buffy had covered her fear with rage, but later she had lain in bed and shook as she realized what might have happened. Even now, thinking about him grabbing her chin and forcing her head around, an icy knot formed in her stomach.
It all came down to what the chip called harm. Spike couldn’t hit or bite her, but he might have been able to… touch…her without it firing. And of course, there had been the Drusilla factor. The mad vampire had no halt on her actions, and Spike had threatened to let the other woman kill her if she didn’t confess to feeling something for him. She shook her head, trying to dispel the leftover fear. He hadn’t actually hurt her. He had even seemed surprised when she had said his only chance with her was while she was unconscious. Buffy had looked herself over after she got home, and everything seemed unmarked. Probably, he thought he get some kind of credit for not taking advantage of her, which he had in a way, since she hadn’t staked him. That state of affairs stood a good chance of changing tonight. Buffy entered Willow and Tara’s dorm and ran up the stairs, desperately hoping that sparing Spike hadn’t been a mistake she would regret the rest of her life.
Willow opened the door at her knock.
“How’s Tara?” Buffy asked, dreading the answer.
Willow opened her mouth but before she could answer, a patient voice called, “I’m fine.”
Buffy entered to see Tara half-sitting, half-lying on the bed with approximately 10 pillows at her back and almost that many blankets wrapped around her.
“What happened?” Buffy asked anxiously, crossing to sit on the bed and taking the witch’s hand. “Did Spike hurt you?”
A mixture of “Yes!” and “Not really,” came out of two different mouths and the Slayer raised an eyebrow.
“Uh, which is it? Do I need to stake him? And don’t hold back, because if I do, that’s good with me.”
Willow and Tara stared at each other a moment, then the red-head sighed.
“He didn’t actually hurt her,” she said reluctantly. “But he came into the fortune-telling tent and wouldn’t leave, and Tara said she’d tell his fortune even though her head hurt, and she tried to, and it went all weird, and she passed out. It was definitely Spike’s fault!” she finished angrily. “And he didn’t even care. He just left.”
“Well, honey, you were going to turn him into a bug,” Tara said mildly. She looked at Buffy. “Willow’s right. Spike came in and and said he wanted us to tell his fortune, but I think he was trying to tease us, maybe scare us a little. Anyway, I started to do a basic palm-reading, and I had some kind of vision. I didn’t say anything when Willow wanted you to come over because you needed to know. I saw a woman with a painted face and dark hair. She reminded me of the one you all said you saw in your dream after you killed Adam.”
Buffy shivered. “The First One? You saw the First Slayer? What did she want?”
“I don’t know. She was drawing something in the sand that looked like this,” Tara fished a tablet from beneath one of the blankets and Buffy looked at the carefully-sketched pattern blankly.
“It looks like some kind of mandala,” the witch continued. “But I don’t know what it means. Before I saw the First One, there were a bunch of images all jumbled together, and I’m pretty sure one was Spike before he was changed into a vampire. Wasn’t that in Victorian times?”
“Yeah,” Buffy nodded slowly. “In 1880.”
Tara nodded. “That was definitely Spike, then. And I saw you fighting him when you were a little younger. Be careful, Buffy,” she said gravely. “Something’s going to happen involving Spike. If the First Slayer’s showing up, it probably will affect you too.”
“Great,” Buffy said dryly, “My favorite things that happen involve Spike.”
Both witches smiled a little, then Willow said seriously, “Spike was supposed to ask a question in his mind before Tara started the reading. We don’t know what it was, but the only thing Tara said when she came out of the trance was, ‘Twice’.”
Buffy shrugged. “What does that mean?”
“I don’t know. I think it’s got something to do with the pattern, though. Look at how the two main lines cross.”
They all examined the pattern again, but it was no more forthcoming.
At last, Buffy sighed and said, “Can I take this with me? I want to show it to Giles tomorrow. He’ll want to hear about what you saw too.”
“Sure,” Tara said, and Willow nodded.
“We’ll come by the Magic Box.”
Back on the steps of the dorm, Buffy flipped open her cell-phone and called her anxious mother and sister. “Tara’s ok. She had some kind of bad vision. I’ll explain more when I get home.”
She set off across the campus, relieved that Tara hadn’t suffered anything truly harmful, and trying to figure out why the First One had shown up again. She didn’t seem to be attacking this time, but Buffy still didn’t trust her.
The sudden sense of someone near her, someone watching, was overwhelming. Buffy stopped and turned, searching the dark campus. “You want me, you deal with me,” she said aloud. “Leave everybody else out of it.”
“Love to, Pet,” Spike drawled, stepping from the shadows near the math building. “That suits me down to the ground. Just you and me, the way it should be.”
Her mouth went dry, her skin turned to ice, and she had to quell the desire to run.
No! I will not be afraid of Spike!
Anger eased the pressure of fear, and a stake was in her hand before she even thought to reach for it.
“Stay away from them,” Buffy said, forcing her voice to steadiness. “Leave Tara and Willow alone, or I'll….”
“Jealous?” Spike laughed. “That’s sweet, Love, but there’s no need. Not that they aren’t a pretty pair….”
So, that’s what seeing red was like. She’d heard the phrase before but never experienced it until now, as what felt like a blood-colored haze filled her vision. The need to protect her friends burned away the last of the fear, and Buffy stalked forward.
“Gently, Slayer.” Spike said, apparently realizing he’d gone a bit too far. “The lovebirds are safe from me. And I didn’t hurt Tara earlier, no matter what they might have said.”
She lowered the stake and got herself under some sort of control. “Tara said what happened to her wasn’t completely your fault,” Buffy said coolly. “Which means that you seriously owe her for your non-dusting.”
“Perhaps I could give her some some hair tips,” he sneered. “What happened to her, anyway?” he added casually. “I’m used to women being all tongue-tied in my presence, but not quite to that extreme.”
“Excuse me,” she said icily. “But we are even less talking buddies than before. Maybe you didn't actually hurt Tara, but nothing would have happened to her if you hadn’t tried to throw your weight around. Wanted your fortune told, yeah, right. Wanted to be a pain in the ass is more like it.”
She brushed past Spike, hating that she had to force herself to move toward him, then remembered what Willow had said and turned back. “What was your question?” Buffy asked. “What question did you ask for the palm reading?”
He grinned widely at her. “Excuse me, Slayer, but didn’t we establish that you and I aren’t talking buddies?”
And with that, he slipped into the shadows.
________________________________________
Spike watched the Slayer storm away, outrage writ large in every fiber.
That was pleasant. Nice to get the last word in for once.
His smile faded. Their encounter had been the only pleasant occurrence of the evening.
Buffy hadn’t been far off in her assessment of Spike’s motives for entering the fortune-telling tent. He had, indeed, wanted to be a pain in the ass, give the witches a bit of a scare, keep the fact that he was still the Big Bad to the forefront of everyone’s mind after the tantalizing reminder of a few weeks ago.
Memory swept over him, and he shivered slightly, flexing his hands.
She was afraid the night we took her. Afraid again, at last.
The Slayer had masked her fear with anger almost instantly, but he had scented it, and the demon within him had been intoxicated. It had been so long since Buffy or the others had looked at him with anything but hate and contempt. Hate was ok – hell, he enjoyed hate – but not contempt.
After realizing he was in love with the Slayer, he’d tried being nice and helpful, but it hadn’t worked. No one had accepted him or even paid attention to him really.
So I tried to kill them a few times. Not as if I actually succeeded. No need to hold a grudge.
Big Bad worked better for him than nice. Fear was definitely a reaction he enjoyed, and both the witches had felt it earlier that night.
Best of all, Buffy was still afraid of him. A whiff of the fear was there, underneath her anger and coldness, just enough to make him grin and strut in her presence. Just enough to make something deep inside grieve.
For it was the wrong kind of fear, the kind that had her pulling out stakes and putting herself between him and her friends, not the kind that sent her into his arms, trembling with a mixture of terror and desire. Of course, he hadn’t completely returned to his former Big Bad days.
… “The only chance you had with me was when I was unconscious.”…
That hadn’t even occurred to him, and really, it should have. Would have once. Even after she was awake, he could have kissed her easily enough, and the chip probably wouldn’t have stopped him, since there would have been no intent to harm. Reduce her to a quivering mass, but not harm. The thought of Buffy’s initial resistance melting to passionate response was enjoyable but he had to admit, not probable. She had been too full of that wrong kind of fear.
She was afraid I’d force her. Afraid I’d rape her. I wouldn’t have. I want her to want it, to want me. To want me so badly that nothing else matters.
Still, even the wrong kind of fear was better than nothing. Wasn’t it? He shook his head, torn by the conflicting impulses to make her scream and make her smile.
Of course, neither impulse looked like getting satisfied anytime soon. Buffy might be afraid of him at the moment, but he had to remember that the Slayer reacted to fear by cutting what she feared into small pieces.
Spike sighed. What he hadn’t wanted in any fashion was involvement in some sort of occult event, but that was what had happened. He had started feeling…something…when Tara called his bluff over the fortune-telling. There hadn’t been a way to get out of it without losing face, but the hair had been rising on the back of his neck as he placed his hand on the table, and then all hell had broken loose.
The witch didn’t seem to have suffered any ill effects, which was probably lucky for him. Between Willow and Buffy, Spike counted himself fortunate to retain all the parts he’d started out with that evening.
And after all that, Tara’s answer to his question didn’t even make any sense, Spike thought as he turned away to head back toward the cemetery.
How could I have met my true love twice?
________________________________________
“And you never found out what Spike’s question was?”
“Nope. He clammed up.” Buffy slowly straightened from her stretch. “I guess I could have handled it better.”
“Perhaps.” Giles set Tara’s drawing aside. “And perhaps it’s unimportant. I understand your reluctance to have anything to do with Spike at this time.”
“Or at any time,” Buffy dropped into a backbend and addressed her Watcher upside down. “But now more than usual.”
Giles’ eyes narrowed, and she swore inwardly, knowing something in her voice had revealed too much. “Buffy, is there something you haven’t told me?”
“Not that I know of,” she said briefly, wanting to get off the subject of Spike. Buffy smoothly flowed from backbend to handstand, and then lifted one arm to the side, balancing on her open hand. She found her balance and centered, focusing on her breath, the calm of the meditation beginning to dispel the tension she’d been under since last night.
Time was unimportant when she was in this state, so Buffy didn’t know how long it was before her Watcher’s voice whispered in a soft counterpoint to the flow of air in and out of her lungs, “We’ve rather discounted Spike since he was chipped.”
“He couldn’t hurt anyone,” she said sleepily. “I didn’t think I had to worry about him.”
“No, neither did I. You aren’t at fault. Still, he managed to capture you.”
It all seemed very far away and unimportant. “Uh-huh.”
“You couldn’t escape on your own. He had to release you.”
“Yeah,” she said sleepily. “Those are some tough chains. They even held Angel.”
“That must have been frightening.”
The meaning of what he was actually saying finally slid in past the hypnotic lullaby of his voice. Buffy’s eyes opened and she regarded Giles steadily, defenses snapping into place. “I’ve had better wake-up calls.”
“And it’s still troubling you to a degree.”
Buffy flipped into a standing position and reached for a towel. “Like to 98.6.” When he didn’t smile, she continued more seriously, “I’m ok, Giles. I’ll admit, it freaked me out to be caught like that, and I know it could have gone a lot…worse.”
She saw his shoulders go rigid and added hastily. “But it didn’t. Go worse, I mean. He didn’t hurt me.”
“But he could have.”
“I go after stuff that could hurt me every night,” Buffy shrugged. “If I spend all my time thinking about it, I can’t be the Slayer.”
Giles looked directly into her eyes. “True. However, you don’t generally leave the ‘stuff that could hurt you’ alive.”
“You’re asking me why I haven’t killed Spike?” she asked, surprised.
He slowly removed his glasses and began to polish them, always a sign of deep thought. “Buffy, Spike has killed untold numbers of people, including two Slayers; violently attacked us; proven himself a threat even with the chip; and demonstrated his probable actions should he ever get the chip removed. However, no one, including myself, has suggested killing him. We’ve even gone to him for help. Why is that?”
“Well,” she said slowly. “He’s had knowledge we could use, and he'd give it to us for some cash. As for killing him, he can’t fight, so I’d have to just stake him in cold blood, which isn’t really…me.”
“Is that the only reason?”
“What other reason could there be?” she asked.
“I don’t know.”
At that moment, shouts erupted from the front of the Magic Box. “Hey, put that down! Stop!” followed by a loud crash.
Buffy and Giles raced from the training room to see Xander and Anya struggling with two large frat types.
“Put that down!” Anya was shouting. “That’s valuable!”
“Awww, did I hurt your scary jewelry?”
At the sight of Buffy and Giles, one of the boys ran through the front door, scattering jewelry in his wake.
Giles caught Xander and Anya’s target in a hold that made his eyes bulge. “Come on,” he whined, suddenly holding very still. “We just wanted to get our girlfriends something weird.”
“I think they’re covered on that issue,” Xander was saying as Buffy ran after the other fleeing thief.
He wasn't hard to catch, but when he glanced over his shoulder he seemed unimpressed by who was chasing him. “What are you going to do if you catch me, babe?” he taunted. “Pull my hair? Scratch?”
I’m getting really tired of people not thinking I'm an issue.
Her tackle caught him at the shoulders, feet slamming into the backs of his knees and bringing him down without problem. Something in her wanted to pull his hair to the point of scalping, and scratch with enough force to remove his eyes, but she kept a firm grip on her anger and settled for pinning him with a knee on his back.
“Give it up,” she said calmly, pulling necklaces and rings from his pockets and stuffing them into her own. “This stuff doesn’t go with your wardrobe anyway.”
As she retrieved the last ring, he suddenly heaved up, causing Buffy to overbalance, and the ring to slip from her grasp as she righted herself. She grabbed for it, and her quarry struggled again, knocking into her wrist and causing the ring to go sailing towards an open sewer grate.
Swearing, she dived after it, hearing him escape, but keeping her attention focused on the ring that was rolling steadily toward the opening in the sidewalk. This being Sunnydale, if it fell through the grate, something would find it and use it to try to destroy the world, which she would have to stop in some messy way. All in all, it would be much easier to catch the ring before it fell.
The ring was teetering at the opening, trying to decide which way to go, when Buffy hooked her index finger through the gold loop and pulled it back.
“Gotcha!” she said triumphantly, but before she could shake it into her palm, the ring slid over her knuckle to fit snugly around the base of her finger.
“Oh,” she said dizzily, sinking to the sidewalk as the street whirled and spun. “Not good. This is so not good.”
…Her slippered feet whispered on the torch-lit corridors. Hurry, she must hurry. If they found that she had hidden the fleeing aristocrats, she would go to the guillotine as swiftly as they…
…The ship’s deck pitched and heaved beneath her feet. She shouted orders in a male’s voice, trying to keep the other men calm that they might survive the storm…
…The screams of the dead and dying rang in her ears as she frantically scoured the battlefield. Where was he? Where had he fallen?…
…The roses were beautiful. She lifted her face to the warmth of the sun. Surely her nightmares were only fancies as everyone said. Nothing could touch her here…
The world resolved back into Sunnydale with Giles kneeling beside her, pulling the ring from her finger.
“Why did you put on the ring?” he demanded, face pale with worry.
“I didn’t mean to, it just sort of happened. I haven’t turned into something have I?” Buffy asked shakily. “I still only have one nose? And no tail or anything?”
“No, physically you’re fine,” Giles said grimly.
“What does it do?” she asked, braced for the worst. “It is the Ring of Lives,” her Watcher answered. “Wearing it brings you knowledge of previous incarnations of your soul.”
“Past lives?” she asked, scrambling to her feet. “Isn’t that awfully psychic friends network?”
“You fight demons, have an energy force for a sister, and you’re quibbling about past lives?” Giles responded.
“Ok, you’ve got a point,” she agreed as they arrived back at the Magic Box.
Buffy emptied the jewelry from her pockets, placing the necklaces and rings on the counter where Anya crooned over them like as if they were lost children.
“They’re all tangled! And scuffed!”
“I was trying to get them back. I didn't know I had to be gentle.” Buffy said defensively.
“I’m sure they’ll be fine with a little rest and some hot soup,” Xander soothed, used to dealing with this sort of thing.
Buffy looked around, vainly searching for the other thief. “My guy got away while I was saving that ring from a fate worse than death. Where’s the other one? Did somebody call the police?”
“We let him go,” Giles said briefly as he began to search through one of the bookcases. “I saw no need for police.”
She looked at him curiously. “Won’t he just get his buddy and come back? Or try to break in and wreck the shop?”
“No.”
“Trust me,” Xander said, eying Giles. “He’s not coming back. I’m not sure I’m coming back, and since Giles said he’d hold our guy responsible if the other one showed up again, I’m pretty sure we won’t be hearing from him either.”
“You’re quite safe as long as you don’t steal anything,” the Watcher said mildly.
“Right. Don’t I owe you a quarter from when I bought a drink the other day? I’ll have it for you tomorrow.”
“That’s nice. Ah, here’s the passage I wanted.” He began to read.
“The wearer of the Ring of Lives
Will walk the steps he took before.
Will see through the eyes of who he once was.
Will taste their joy.
Will know their sorrow.
Let it not be worn lightly,
Lest past and present blur.”
He closed the book and looked at Buffy over the tops of his glasses.
Anya looked startled. “You put on the Ring of Lives? You shouldn’t do things like that. It's very dangerous.”
“It was an accident!” Buffy protested. “I wasn’t using it to accessorize.”
“Yes, well, it’s done now,” Giles said. “You only had the ring on for a few moments. There shouldn’t be any harmful effects, as long as you don’t put it on again.”
“Not planning to. Of course, hello, didn’t plan to put it on the first time.”
“What were you?” Anya asked with interest. “A harem girl? A king’s mistress? A brothel-owner?”
Xander blinked. “Yeah, Buffy, it would probably be traumatic to keep all that locked up inside.” He put a hand on her shoulder. “We’re here for you.”
“Here for who?” Willow asked, as she and Tara entered the shop.
“Buffy. Especially if she was a harem girl.”
“Uh, OK.” Willow said cautiously. “Only, if you need a part-time job, I think they’re hiring over at the Student Center.”
“Sorry, no harem girl, then or now,” Buffy said dryly. At the witches’ questioning looks, she sighed and continued. “A couple of guys tried to steal some jewelry. While I was tackling one, I accidentally put on a ring that shows people their past lives. Don’t get all worked up,” she added. “They all seemed pretty un-sexy.”
“Past lives?” Tara said, frowning. She sat down at the research table, absently rubbing her forehead. “You saw your past lives?”
“Just little bits, nothing much.”
“So, tell us what you saw,” Xander said eagerly. “What did the Slayer we all know and love used to be up to?”
Giles nodded. “Such information could, indeed, be instructive. An interesting report for the Council.”
Buffy smiled at him with slight malice. “Is that Watcher-speak for ‘I’m dying to know, but way too British to let on? Especially after I’ve been all lectury at my Slayer?'”
“It could be taken that way, yes.”
“Ok,” she relented. “I always seemed to be pretty much into fighting. I was hiding some people in a big house or a castle. If they were found, I’d be punished too. I was a guy once, I think, a ship captain, in a big storm. Then, I was looking for somebody on a battlefield. Everyone was dead, but someone I cared about was out there.”
Buffy sighed then brightened a little. “The last one I saw was kind of nice. It was a pretty day, and I was in a garden with a lot of roses. I had a bad dream but wasn’t too worried about it. Everything was really peaceful. Maybe my soul decided to take a life off and rest up.”
“That all sounds fascinating,” Giles said with a broad smile. “Tonight, perhaps you could write down your impressions and fill in as much detail as you can remember.”
“Sure.” She noticed the darkened sky outside the shop and glanced at her watch. “Oops. Gotta run. I promised Mom I’d pick up some Chinese on the way home.”
________________________________________
After she left, Giles turned his attention to Willow and Tara. “Buffy told me what happened at the carnival, but I’d like to hear it in your own words.”
“Ok,” Willow said eagerly and described the fortune-telling incident with plenty of side commentary on Spike’s perfidy and Tara’s general blamelessness.
Giles listened attentively, but his eyes kept slipping to Tara. The blonde witch was quiet as usual, but she was frowning slightly and there a line of tension between her eyebrows.
“Tara?” he asked gently. “Can you describe the vision?”
She jumped. “Oh, sure. I can do that.”
Giles heard her out, becoming more troubled by the instant. The First Slayer showing up was bad enough, but in conjunction with Spike….
He held out the drawing he’d retrieved from the training room. “And this, to the best of your recollection, is the pattern she drew?”
Tara nodded.
“I’ll have to do some research,” Giles said. “This isn't familiar to me.”
Anya finished sorting the rescued jewelry and walked over to peer at the drawing. “It’s the soul-mate mandala,” she said matter-of-factly.
The Watcher’s eyebrows shot to his hairline. “It’s the what?”
“The soul-mate mandala. It tells where in your life you will meet the person you’re destined for. I used it in my vengeance days to help a woman tell if the man who betrayed her was her soul-mate. You could set up extra punishment if he was. Weird though. You only have one soul-mate, and these lines cross twice. This one happened within a few years of now.” She measured with her finger and thumb. “And this one was more than a 100 years ago. That doesn’t make any sense.”
“Twice,” Tara said slowly. “The answer to Spike’s question was twice.”
Anya shrugged. “Those meetings were over 100 years apart, so his soul-mate must be another vampire.”
The witches stared at each other and then at the rapidly-paling Giles.
“Or a soul that was reincarnated,” Willow whispered.
“Hey, yeah, that could be,” Xander said cheerfully oblivious to the horrified expressions around him. “Wonder who it is? Wouldn’t it be awful to find out your soul-mate was Spike? You’re running around all happy, not knowing you’re supposed to be with a soulless demon. Hate to be in their shoes.”
His smile slid off his face as he looked around at witches and Watcher. “What?”
“Tara’s vision involved the First Slayer,” Giles said slowly. “I believe we can assume her presence provides a clue regarding the identity of Spike’s soulmate.”
Anya nodded brightly. “It’s Buffy, right?”
“Right,” Willow whispered.
“WRONG!” Xander shook his head violently. “There’s just no way. Buffy and Spike hate each other.”
“Oh, you don’t have to like your soul-mate,” Anya pointed out. “But they’re still whom you’re meant to be with. You’ll be drawn to them. You can’t help it. They’re who your soul is looking for.”
“Buffy putting on the reincarnation ring can’t be an accident,” Tara said faintly. “This is karma-type stuff, all tied together. I started getting that same type of headache I had the other night in the fortune-telling tent when she talked about her past lives. It’s probably why I had the vision in the first place. Maybe even why Spike showed up. ”
Xander suddenly relaxed. “We’re forgetting something! Spike doesn’t have a soul, so it can’t have a mate. This can’t be what we’re all trying really hard not to think about.”
“I wish you were correct, Xander, but the person who was changed shapes the vampire they become. Spike’s human soul could easily underlie his current personality.”
There was a long pause. “You know, Buffy’s going to go absolutely freakin’ ballistic when she hears this,” Xander said grimly.
Anya thought it over. “She will be very angry, won’t she? Perhaps violent.” She looked at Willow. “You’re her best friend. She probably won’t injure you.”
“Oh, no! No. If I have to tell her, I’m going to mail it in a postcard from far, far away.”
“I’m not telling her, either,” Xander said firmly. “We’ve had a couple of this-is-for-your-own-good-type discussions before, and she didn’t kill me or anything, but I’m not doing this.”
“I’ll tell her,” Giles said, sternly repressing a shudder. “I am her Watcher. But not tonight.”
Willow nodded. “Let her eat her egg roll in peace.”