Tara jumped as she heard the grating rasp of the Zippo's wheel on its flint, but a gentle smile spread to her lips as the flame illuminated the planes of the vampire's face. She extended a hand, which the vampire took as their protocols dictated he should, letting her know that it was really him rather than The First.

Spike used the grip to tug her close enough for a welcoming hug before he set her free, and gave a nod to Bee who was acting as the witch's partner.

"How goes it?" Spike had already circled the building site's perimeter at a distance. He had eavesdropped on the conversations of the pairs of watchers and potentials, listening for any signs of undue rancour between them and had been moderately surprised to find that even the normal bickering that seemed par for the course when the group were at the school was missing. This group seemed far less edgy than when he had made a similar visit to the other half of his group earlier in the night.

"I put a calming ch-charm over the area," Tara responded as if she almost expected the vampire to berate her for it. When he gave an encouraging smile instead she continued. "I need to strengthen it about every half hour because of the size of the area and I think the seal sort of wears it down... but so far no one's made a try for the seal."

"Knew I put you in charge for a reason," Spike replied with a grin.

"Spike, I-I."

The vamp pressed a single finger to her lips and turned to Bee. He gave a jerk of his head so that his chin pointed to a pair of watchers who stood about thirty yards along the perimeter from where they were. "Why don't you keep them two company for now, pint size, an' me an' Glinda'll go check on the troops? I'll give her back when we've worked our way round."

He waited until Bee was half way over to her new post and the watchers had obviously seen her coming before he put an arm around the witch's shoulders and began to steer her in the opposite direction, pausing when they were out of easy hearing range for any of the seal's other guards. He kept his voice low as he spoke. "Something you want to ask, precious, or d'you want me to take a guess at what's troubling you?"

"I, well, I was wondering why you put me in charge of a group. I mean Wes-." She hesitated when Spike gave a soft sigh, not of impatience or even really disappointment, but almost as if this had been what he expected.

"Kept Wes back 'cause if there're any more trips like that one to Gilroy to be made he's a good guy to have at my back. Picked you for all sorts of reasons.

First an' foremost, I trust you." Spike let that dangle in the air for long enough to make sure Tara took in its full significance before he continued.

"Then there's the fact that, unlike Wes, you've been training with most of these guys. You know their names, who they are, what they're like, an' that counts for a lot.

You've got a heart that's pure an' true and you're braver when it comes to the crunch than you think. That means that not only are you goin' to be the last person to cave to the vibe that that goat's head doodad is givin' out, but if there's magic to be done, then you're the best placed to do it. Knew it from a long way back, an' I guess from what I heard about you an' the watcher's bird doin' them wards the other day that maybe you've had to begin to accept it, too. You're one in a million, little owl. A heart pure as yours asks the right way for somethin' that doesn't go against her ways an' that goddess of yours isn't gonna have the heart to say no to you any more'n the rest of us would. Maybe you're not as showy as Red used to be. I can't see you hacking your enemies apart with a bag full of knives. It's not the way you work... Not who you are, an' that's not the sort of power that I'd ever want you to know, but when it comes to drawin' on the power that flows through the earth an' using it to protect those around you, the only limits there are to what you can do are those you set on yourself. S'why the watcher bint had to pull the power out through you to do the wards. She could tell it was there, but she had to work against the fact you didn't believe you could. Like I say, 'long as you stick to stuff as your goddess would be willing to give, an' you give her the respect that's her due... Figure even with all them watchers an' all, you're the best magic user we've got."

"Willow-."

"Willow would've been swallowed up by that thing an' spat back out by now. Willow took power wherever she could find it, good or ill, an' never stopped to wonder whether she should do anythin', just whether she could. That seal glowin' the way it is, she'd've been like a cat in a field of catnip. You've got a fortitude that Red never had in her life. School came easy to her. Magic came easy to her an' she never appreciated anythin' or anyone she had when she'd got them, because she never had to work to get any of them. Not Wolf Boy, not you, an' not even the power to bring someone back from the dead. Red was fireworks on the fourth of July, noisy, gaudy and brief. You're the moon in all its womanly serenity.

You're wiser an' stronger than ever Red was an', here an' now, I'd sooner have you than two of her. It's not just me as thinks so, neither. Wager folks here would mostly all do anything you wanted for the askin'. They know you won't ask more from them than you'd give yourself and that they're not just chess pieces on a board to you that you'd sacrifice as need be... That's more my line."

"Even though you're the one who should be back in bed with Buffy, but you're out here checking on us and doing the pep talk instead?" Tara raised an eyebrow over a suspiciously bright eye.

"A good commander always knows what's happenin' with his troops, an' I put my two groups on nights so that I'd be able to check on them. No point doin' that if I'm going to stay in m'pit."

"And Buffy doesn't object?"

Spike gave a wicked grin and began to steer the witch toward the next pair of sentries. "That'd depend how much I tire her out beforehand, poppet."

 

---

 

"Gah!" Buffy shivered as the naked vampire enfolded her in his arms. "You know most women just have to worry about cold feet."

"Most women don't have a gorgeous hunk of man flesh to warm them up." Spike turned Buffy to face him and pressed a languorous kiss to her lips, his hands rubbing her back as if the friction would compensate for the chill that the night had given his flesh.

"Most women don't have their guys sneaking out of their bed to visit other women less than a week before their wedding," Buffy retaliated, but not until her contented sigh had given away the fact that she was nowhere near as annoyed with him as she might pretend.

"Can I help it if I'm popular?" Spike replied, and despite the darkness Buffy knew there was a smirk on his lips.

In a trice she rolled them until she straddled her fiancé's waist as he lay on his back. Her fingers traced their way along his arms until they met and intertwined with his, holding his hands out to either side of his head. "You can help if you're a great big undead flirt," she answered, ducking her head to claim another kiss.

"I do what it takes to keep morale up."

Buffy couldn't prevent her mind from flashing on the image of Spike in nothing but a pair of jeans, demonstrating hand to hand moves for an audience of enraptured potentials, every lithe muscle on display. They definitely paid more attention to his teaching than they did to hers. She wasn't shivering any more.

"An' I think you mean a great big undead tease. Bints all know I'm taken, heart an'... well, maybe not soul."

"Better be," Buffy mock threatened as she shifted against him, her body instinctively seeking to unite more intimately with his.

"Till the end of the world, starshine," Spike answered as Buffy enveloped him in her warmth.

There were no more words, just the unhurried slip of flesh on flesh and a flood of reverence and love as Spike allowed his emotions to flow into her as freely as his seed.

Long minutes later Buffy freed her hands from his and laid her head on his shoulder. Her lips pressed against the mark of her claiming with nibbling kisses and she earned a rumble from Spike's throat that came somewhere between a growl and a purr for her efforts. "We are so going to have to stop doing this all the time now that there's no hot water to wash in, or I am going to be stinky Buffy."

There was something about the idea of Buffy being marked so pervasively with his scent that it was obvious not only to his vampire senses but to those of every male with whom she came in contact that appealed to Spike at a primitive level. Clearer than any words could have expressed, his dick, which had previously been semi-rigid in the cocoon of Buffy's muscles, returned to attention.

Buffy's eyes widened as Spike rolled them over once more. His hips slammed hard against hers once and then his pelvis began grinding in a tiny figure eight that pressed on all the right spots. His bent his head to tease one tiny erect nipple with the brush of his tongue.

In a breathless gasp Buffy found her voice to protest feebly, even though her body's instinctive arch toward him belied her words. "This would be the vamp version of stopping, huh?"

"I guess I'll just have to lick you all clean when we finish," the vampire growled, amusement in his words, before he turned his attention to her other breast. He sucked hard on the rosy bud at its tip before administering a playful nip that induced Buffy to give a ragged moan. His tongue swept lower to lick a bead of sweat from where the curve of her breast met her ribcage. "Every salty inch."

 

---

 

"Spike? Are you awake?" Buffy whispered. Morning light filtered through the sheeting that covered the tiny window in the roof of their room and the slayer knew that the time had come.

"More or less. Wha's up, apple blossom?" The vampire yawned and kissed the bare shoulder in front of him.

"I'm going to the vineyard. Today." She rolled over to face him, her eyes holding a plea that he didn't yet understand. "I'm tired of waiting for him to come to us. I'm tired of taking the defensive."

"Just say the word and I'm there. You know that."

"I know... and... I appreciate it. Really, I do..."

"But?" Spike asked, beginning to realise what was coming.

"But if you're right about him having some weapon there, then you aren't going to be any better placed to get it or use it than Caleb is. He won't expect us to hit during the day. We've been keeping to night time patrols, so far, and we haven't made a direct attack. It's our best chance."

"We could take the DeSoto..." Spike knew he sounded pathetically over-eager.

"I... You know that when it comes to a fight that there's no one on this earth that I'd rather have at my back than you, but there's more to this than that. I don't know why, but my gut is saying that this is a slayer thing. This is something we have to do. Me and Faith. Together. She's spent too long in my shadow. We have to do this and we have to do it as equal partners. If you're with us, then Faith ends up being the third wheel. We have to go alone. One to distract Caleb and one to find the slayer spear of destiny or whatever it is."

Spike rolled to the edge of the bed and swung his legs over the side, rubbing at his face with both hands, not wanting to let her feel his turbid jumble of confusion and resentment, lest it undermine her.

"I-. Hell, you know already how much it'll tear away inside me, knowin' that you're in danger an' feelin' that I should be there to help you. Figure if you know that, an' you still feel it's not my place, then 'bout all I can do is give you my blessin'."

"I don't get it either, Spike." Buffy shuffled across the mattress on her knees and wrapped her arms around Spike's shoulders, pressing against his back. Spike was surprised to find that her own feeling of loss echoed his own. "But it feels right. It feels like something we have to do. It's a step that I have to take with Faith, but it's just one step and the rest of the way it'll be me and you."

"Bollocks!" Spike gave a resigned sigh. "Buffy, you know I'll be waiting right here when you get back."

"I expected more pacing in the lobby, actually."

"Well, yeah, like as not, but here in the building, waiting to hail the conquering heroes just the same."

"Heyyyyy," Buffy allowed a touch of humour to return to her voice now that she had his acceptance. It would have been easier for her to sneak out while he thought she was busy with a training session, maybe even to leave him a note, but it would have been wrong somehow to begin this with a deception. "No hailing any heroes other than me."

"I envy them. Isn't that the strangest thing?" The speaker's features and even the softness of her tone might have resembled Buffy's in every detail but her casual familiarity with the turncoat preacher, with whom she strolled the underground wine cellar, was proof enough that it was really The First.

"Well, it does throw me a tad. I mean, they're just…" Caleb screwed his face into a grimace. "Well, they're barely more than animals, feedin' off each other's flesh. It's nauseatin'. But you… you're everywhere." His voice grew louder and his expression more rapt as he continued. "You're in the hearts of little children. You're in the souls of the rich. You're the fire that makes people kill and hate, the fire that will cure the world of weakness. They're just sinners. You are sin."

"I do enjoy your sermons," the phantasm replied, but her cleric was not yet done.

"And you're in me. Gave me strength no man can have." His eyes were filled with an insane reverence. His gratitude obvious to the world, had anyone else been there to see.

"You're the only man strong enough to be my vessel. And I know you feel me but… I know why they grab at each other. To feel. I want to feel." The First's voice was filled with yearning, before it turned to ice. "I want to wrap my hands around an innocent neck and feel it crack."

"Amen," the clergyman added with all the fervour of a television evangelist.

"But the time when that will happen draws nearer..." She fixed Caleb with a stern glare. "If you don't continue to let the slayers and their tame vampire annihilate all my earthly followers."

"The slayers and their people won't matter. Let them chase our little no-eyed boys all 'round town. It shouldn't be long now. Prophesies say one thing, brute strength says another. We'll get it out."

"I heard you, Caleb."

"We're almost there," the clergyman argued.

"Yes. That's true. Now rouse the Bringers that we have got left and get them back to work."

A series of dull thuds drew their attention to the stairs that led up to ground level, and a bringer landed almost at their feet, his own dagger embedded in his chest. Buffy stood on a small landing where the staircase took a right turn. Everything about her demeanour announced that this time she had come to settle this. "Hey. I heard you got something of mine." Buffy placed a hand on the metal rail at each side of the staircase and lifted her feet so she slid gracefully and swiftly to the basement, appearing as practiced as any mariner. "Some kind of holy hand grenade or something?"

Once she reached the lower level, her eyes darted left and right, taking in the huge casks that seemed to be built into the walls of the large, open chamber. Other not quite so large drums sat in groups on their ends, and the smallest ones, which were still at least as large as your average garden rain barrel sat on racks two or three high or were stacked on their sides. Nowhere was there anything to indicate where something might be hidden. There was no doorway, no staircase to lead down to the level where she and Spike had heard the bringers digging.

Caleb sauntered toward her, his tone casual and yet ominous, just like every crooked good ol' boy sheriff in a slew of movies from the seventies and eighties. "Well, if it ain't the long-anticipated Slayer. I thought you might have taken me up on that little invitation a mite sooner. I guess li'l Shannon wasn't as convincing as she might have been…"

"Where's it at?" Buffy interrupted. She wasn't about to let him know just how big an effect his invitation had had on her. "I'm going to find it sooner or later."

Caleb continued to close the distance between them with the same nonchalant gait. "No, you're not. I lay one hand on you and you're just a dead little girl."

"Lay a hand on me." Buffy replied, turning her words into a dare with a tilt of her head and a raised eyebrow that would have made Spike proud. "If you can."

Caleb smiled complacently and pulled his arm back to throw a punch. As his fist flew forward with a force not known to any human, Buffy bent over backward, almost into the crab position, and the blow sailed right over her head.

"You do realise that if you wanted that punch to be a surprise you shouldn't let your jawas know what's going on." She twisted out of the way as he staggered forward, his momentum throwing him off balance.

The preacher let loose with a right hook and Buffy ducked under his flailing arm and dove forward, tucking into a roll that brought her up several yards away. Caleb's insincere smile had faded now and when he turned to face her his countenance was livid with rage. He lunged for Buffy like an NFL linebacker aiming to sack the quarterback, his shoulder aimed squarely for her solar plexus, but Buffy flipped up into a handstand on top of one of the upended casks, and then back onto her toes atop one of the stacks of kegs, her balance so perfect that the pyramid didn't move so much as a fraction of an inch. Buffy danced her way along the top row of barrels. "And people say that cheerleading is no use in real life?" she goaded the one-time clergyman, scanning the room from her new vantage point as she did so for any way to a lower level or anything sufficiently out of place to indicate a possible cache.

Caleb made a grab for Buffy's ankles but was just a touch too slow. His weight and the strength behind his lunge sent the stacked drums crashing down around him, splashing red wine all over him as they tumbled to the floor. He threw aside shards of wood and metal as he got to his feet, looking around frantically for his opponent. His gaze fell on the blonde, who sat perched atop one of the upended casks, her legs swinging like those of a small child on a porch swing as she watched him. She raised her eyes to look over his shoulder. His head whipped around to find another Buffy staring down from where she was walking the rafters behind him like a tightrope.

"Guessing that IQ isn't a major requirement when you're recruiting?" Buffy asked her simulacrum as Caleb's head twisted backward and forward.

The woman on the barrel shook her head with frustration. "Caleb, this is getting embarrassing."

Caleb lunged at the feet of the Buffy behind him, but she tucked into a handstand and back upright again, before she added one more somersault as she dismounted, landing yards from the disoriented man. Caleb made another desperate dive, but when Buffy twisted out of his reach he hit the ground hard near where The First was sitting.

"Do you have to look like that?" he asked, as he raised his eyes toward his deity.

"Will you concentrate?" she retorted.

"It's just a little confusing," Caleb half-sighed, sounding vaguely exasperated.

"Fine. Go. Kill." The First seemed to fold in on itself, and then from its centre there was a ball of light that expanded sideways and blinked into nothingness.

Buffy grinned down at the preacher from the top of a pile of drums. "You know, it seems to me like your floor is leaking more than solid concrete should." She looked down at the steadily shrinking puddle of wine on the floor.

This time, instead of making a grab for her, Caleb tugged away the cask from under her feet.

Buffy skipped to the next barrel along and pushed off against it, grabbing at one of the ceiling beams and swinging to land on the floor once more out of Caleb's reach, and closer to the area where the wine was draining from.

Choosing one of the foremost kegs at random, Buffy grabbed the top edge with a hand on either side and tilted it until it fell over on its side before she kicked it in the cleric's direction. Maybe she couldn't go toe-to-toe with this guy, but she still had slayer strength.

The First's disciple stared at her from his hunched position where he seemed to be using one of the casks to help him stay upright despite his breathless, scarlet-faced fury, only dodging out of the way of the incoming barrel at the last instant. "You whore."

"You know, you really should watch your language," Buffy remonstrated, her voice painfully chirpy as she skipped her way to the top of a rack. "If someone didn't know you, they might think you were a woman-hating prick."

Caleb grabbed another of the containers and hoisting it over his head, he threw it straight at the slayer, only to have her nimbly twist out of the way and let it go sailing past her. It smashed to kindling as it hit the nearby wall, splashing more full-bodied red over the floor. He snatched another barrel from its resting place and this time he scored a perfect hit.

Buffy fell backward, but she managed to push the drum to one side before it crushed her between it and the floor. She rolled to her feet, her eyes meeting the preacher's before they dropped to the now exposed trapdoor in the floor and then returned to Caleb, both of them watching for the tell that would give away their opponent's next move. The slayer began to circle round, as if hoping to draw him away from his spot just feet from the way to the chambers below.

Caleb hurled another keg in her direction and she dodged to one side. The impact sent one of the racks tumbling, casks spilling in all directions and covering the entrance to the lower level in a pile of debris. "Not so smart now, are you, little girl?"

Just then a reedy electronic version of "London Calling" began to play from the pocket of the slayer's jacket. Buffy's eyes sparkled with laughter as the cleric seemed to sense something wrong for the first time and began to lumber his way toward her over the mound of wood and metal in his way. The slayer darted up the stairs to the upper level. "Gotta go. My ride's here."

For a second the preacher stared after her retreating form, but then with a howl of rage he began to pull the mess away from the access hatch that led down to the excavations below.

 

---

Earlier that morning

 

"Yeah, yeah!" Faith rolled her eyes at Spike. "I've got it. Go in through the tunnels. Kill any bringers that get in the way. Find Excalibur Mark II and steal it. Need reinforcements, call Buffy's cell. Got the goods, call yours and Buffy can get the hell outta Dodge. It's not rocket science. I get Scottie here on Wes's motorcycle for my getaway driver. B gets Wes with Giles' Jeep. Either way, we're out of there pronto."

"Alright, then," the vampire concurred slightly morosely before passing his cell over to Buffy.

The slayer gave him a grateful smile and pushed the device into the opposite pocket to the one where she carried her own phone. "I never expected to say this to you, but it's a good plan," she whispered, leaning in close to his ear. "It'll work. He won't be expecting us to come from both sides."

"I hope you're right, pet." Spike turned and rested his forehead against hers, long pale digits brushing a caress against the claim mark on her neck. "Just make sure you don't let him lay so much as a grubby finger on you."

Buffy placed her hand over his. "Check. I've got all the fingers on me that I want."

"Geez, get a room," Faith teased scornfully, but she didn't pull her own hand free of James's as the couple made their way out into the false dawn.

Buffy pushed onto tiptoe and wound her fingers in Spike's curls to draw his lips down to meet hers. His arms folded around her, holding her close until she drew her head back and then slipping reluctantly away to let her go. "Come on, Wes. Quicker we go the more chance we have of getting back before he combusts from pure impatience."

"Actually," Wes corrected her even as she pushed him out the door. "When we can leave is rather more dependent on how long it takes Faith to find this thing you're meant to wield, and whether it's specific to you or whether it can be used by any slayer."

Buffy turned at the bottom of the school steps and gave Spike an apologetic smile. "Back soon," she mouthed silently.

"Just come back in one piece an' I'll be happy," Spike whispered in a belated reply as he stood in the school's doorway to watch Giles' 4x4 disappear down the drive.

 

---

 

Faith twisted the neck on the last remaining bringer. For the first time she was free to give her attention to the weapon that rested with its blade embedded in solid rock. The bringers had chipped away the granite surrounding it into a podium of sorts. The rock immediately adjacent to the blade had been burned and blackened, melted almost into glass. The edge of the blade was a gleaming silver, the remainder a gleaming metallic red. There was a grip behind the axe head and the end of the wooden shaft was sharpened into a lethal point. Faith couldn't help but gaze at the axe in awe. Slowly, she made her way forward, a growing sense of belonging coming over her. She reached out and with almost no effort she pulled the axe from its resting place. She tested its weight in her hands and for the first time since her father had walked out she felt like she was home.

Just as Buffy had expected, Spike was waiting for her in the entrance hall. His eyes seemed to burn into hers as soon as she walked through the door.

With a huffing breath that might have been an amused snort, Wes announced his intention to check on Marie and Rosa before he joined the debriefing in the library.

As soon as her arms wrapped around Spike's neck, she felt a rush of desire that swamped her awareness like a tidal wave, though it was equally matched by her own fight-induced arousal.

Spike's hands slipped under her coat and found the curves of her behind, lifting her and pulling her close against him. His human teeth tugged and nibbled at her earlobe in between whispered promises and endearments. "You know that you are soddin' amazing, right? You really showed that wanker. Could see it all so clear, it was almost like I could feel you makin' every turn, every jump, every damn handstand. Like I could feel my muscles movin' to match yours."

The words conjured images of a different sort of communion and Buffy reacted instinctively, even though a small part of her brain was telling her that they were right out in the open. Her legs wrapped around Spike's waist, so that she could feel the hardness of his dick pressing against her centre and, unable to help herself, she began to rock against him. Her back slammed into the hardwood panelling and she gasped as Spike matched her small but forceful thrusts.

"You make me hard as an iron bar... even when you're half a town away. The way you move..." His hands no longer needed to hold Buffy in place, he skimmed his fingers along her sides under her coat, feeling her shiver in response to the barest touch through the cotton of her top, even before his thumbs stretched across to brush against her breasts, teasing until her nipples stood so erect they almost seemed to grate against the lace of her bra, creating sensual pain with her every movement. "All that grace... an' all that power." He splayed his fingers as one hand slid down her body as if laying a territorial claim to her womb before it strayed even lower. His kisses became more open-mouthed, working his way down to her collar bone with playful nips and sucks that stopped just short of anything that might leave a mark. "Like a mountain lion."

Buffy's gentle mewl as his fingernail rasped its way over the central seam of her jeans made him grin against the golden skin of her neck, and he let it repeat its trail several times before he began to press more firmly against her, eventually using his whole hand to provide friction where she needed it most. When her mewling shifted to moaning he pressed his other hand over her mouth, and drew back his head, only to fasten onto the other side of her neck. Finding the scar that marked his claim with unerring accuracy, he didn't even need to draw blood. His tongue traced the raised lines on her flesh as he sucked at her skin. The writhing of their bodies became more frantic and Spike pressed down harder with the hand that covered Buffy's mouth, stifling her rapturous scream. It took every one of his one hundred and twenty two years of experience not to soil his jeans as he felt the waves of second hand euphoria wash over him. Buffy trembled through orgasm after orgasm with only the wall at her back holding them up as he pulled at the sensitised area on her neck until her body couldn't take any more and she slipped into unconsciousness.

 

---

 

Giles lifted the axe, turning it over in his hands, peering at the gleaming metal finish on the blade and trying out different ways of holding it. "This is really rather ingenious," Giles commented, trying first a hacking motion, then, gripping the side of the blade, he used a reverse thrust to stake an imaginary opponent, before reversing his swing to slash open the throat of another. "I wonder what it's called."

Faith shifted her weight onto one leg, tilted her head and gave the watcher a sceptical look. "Well, gee, Giles... What say, since it looks like an axe, feels like an axe and swings like an axe, that we call it an axe?"

"There's no need to be facetious. It's clearly intended to be used as a stake and almost-." Giles coughed as if to clear his throat before going back to his minute inspection of the weapon.

"Almost what, Giles?" James asked.

The watcher reddened slightly. "Well, almost like one of those Klingon ceremonial weapons. I mean I only watched it that year I wasn't working and it was really Spike who put it on. It was just that occasionally I happened to be in the room at the time."

James leaned forward and patted the older watcher on the forearm. "It's okay. She won't tell anyone other than all the... Scoobies, I think you call them, and maybe Lydia about your Sci-Fi habit. She doesn't actually talk to Quentin."

"But you say that you can feel a mystical connection when you hold it?" Giles asked the slayer, ignoring his future humiliation.

"It's not like I came in my pants," Faith retorted. "But, yeah, it feels like there's power there and it's like it's mine. Not in an 'I paid for it' sort of way, but more like it was a part of me that was missing only I never knew it up until now."

"In addition to being ancient, it's clearly mystical."

"Ooh," came a chirpy voice from the doorway. "I know this one... 'Cause it's all shiny?"

"Did someone announce a day of Giles mockery without telling me?" the watcher asked as Buffy made her way into the room, looking rather flushed, closely followed by a rather smug looking Spike.

"Not that I know of," the vamp responded, "but I'm sure we can oblige."

"Ooh!" Buffy's eyes widened as she got her first look at the axe. "It really is shiny. Does this mean that light bulbs are mystical, too?"

Faith reached out and took the weapon from Giles. Holding it by the handle she tossed it underarm, sending it spinning in a high arc toward Buffy. The blonde slayer grabbed it out of the air, twirled it a couple of times like a majorette's baton before imitating the moves that Giles had made a minute before, albeit in a slightly different order.

"Actually, B, there's also the whole Excalibur deal."

"Faith said she could feel a connection with the weapon?" Giles prodded.

Buffy tossed the axe back toward Faith who caught it just as deftly as she had. "Hoo, yeah. There's a feeling. Can only think of one thing that feels more like it belongs to me."

Giles gave his slayer a puzzled look, but it was Spike who answered for her. "That thing had better be five foot ten, rakishly handsome, a bottle blond, an' answer to the name of Spike," he mock growled, as he stalked up the library's central aisle and wrapped his arms around her from behind, nuzzling at her neck.

Buffy twisted to get a view of his face and batted her eyelashes innocently. "Mr Gordo's not that tall."

Spike planted a string of teasing kisses down the side of Buffy's neck as she squirmed in his arms. "See what I have to put up with... an' this is before we're even married. God only knows what she'll be like once she gets the other ring on her finger."

 

---

Monday, July 15th, 2002

 

"Nothing?" Buffy asked the assembled watchers in a disbelieving tone.

"You can't always find the information you're looking for in the first volume that comes to hand," Penelope offered consolingly, "but I'm sure we'll find the answers soon."

Giles sighed. "We have teams working at the town library, the main university library, the archaeology department library and the town museum. There are people working on Bee's books and the curator's private collection as well as the council library. There has to be something somewhere about either the weapon itself or what was on the site before the vineyard existed to give us a clue as to what we're dealing with. If Caleb knew to look for the inscription at that mission, there must have been some clue that told him where to look. With enough time we'll track it down. I find it hard to believe that a weapon like this could exist without some word of it reaching the council."

"Who says they didn't know? It's not like they go out of their way to spread the news and we don't have 'enough time', Giles. In case you've forgotten, I am getting married in five days. I'd really rather not have this Caleb creep decide that he's officiating at the ceremony... and I can't say that I'm not worried about the guy who is doing it, but since he won't move from where his parishioners expect him to be, there's not a lot I can do about that other than try to get rid of these guys as soon as possible. We did our bit. We went out there and got the thing. The potentials and your guys are all keeping an eye on the seal... but sooner or later if you don't get your act together and get me some answers we're going to send a relief squad out there and it'll be our guys that have turned into the next generation of bringers or strung each other up over that seal."

"Buffy, I'm sure we'll find something soon."

"You better hope for all our sakes that soon is soon enough."

 

---

Tuesday, July 16th, 2002

 

Penny looked at her single page of hand written notes that condensed the progress of the various teams. "It seems that the vineyard was originally set up by some Benedictine monks. The site was sold into private ownership after a major 'quake destroyed the monastery building in the 1920's but the winery survived. However, there is some evidence to suggest that the monastery may have been built on the site of a Pagan temple."

"We talking Indian, here?" Spike asked.

"Native American, Spike!" Buffy corrected him rather sharply.

"It's difficult to say. The descriptions aren't exactly precise," the watcher admitted.

"Well, try," Buffy ordered, seeming to add the word, "please" as a conscious attempt to mitigate her short temper slightly. "We've got that purification crystal that we ordered now, and you tell us that we've got a volunteer to use it, even if he doesn't want people to know who it is until it's time. We've got the shiny axe. If you don't come up with something soon, then we're just going to have to raid the butchers, open up that hole in the ground and go see what all the fuss is about, but I'd really rather it wasn't a kamikaze mission."

"Isn't there some hocus pocus you could maybe do on the actual axe to get more information?" Faith asked, her fingertips brushing up and down the weapon's haft where it rested atop her thighs in an almost sensual caress.

"Frankly, unless we have some concept of the level of power that we're dealing with, or at the very least an intimation that the power within it is benign, I'm very loath to ask anyone to try," Giles told her.

"Too damn right," Spike agreed. "Not gonna let anything dark get its claws into Glinda."

 

---

Wednesday, July 17th, 2002

 

"So, hundreds of watchers looking at thousands of books and we're no further forward than we were yesterday?" Buffy demanded, almost hysterically, despite the soothing hands that caressed her arms and back with calming strokes. "We have a little over seventy two hours to deal with this thing, Giles! My aunt is flying into town in two days time. I already had to tell her that the hotel where she was originally booked to stay had been closed 'cause all the staff had gastric flu and book her in somewhere out of town, but I still have to meet her at the airport and take her to her hotel and make it look like the world is not about to end. We need answers, Giles!"

"We've found hundreds of references that could be it, Buffy. The problem is simply that none of the illustrations or descriptions are definitive. It could be The Axe of Dekeron, in which case it would be unspeakably evil or it might just as easily be The Reaper of the Tigris, in which case the power within the axe is neither good nor evil except in how it is used. Or it could be any one of a hundred others. You see our problem?"

Spike rose to his feet, taking Buffy's hand as his movement tipped her from his lap. "Come on, pet. Watchers aren't finding anything out while you're yelling at them."

"Watchers aren't finding anything out, period," Buffy countered, tears of frustration threatening to overflow her eyes.

"Shhhh..." Spike brushed his lips against her forehead and then leaned down to rest his brow against hers while his arms gathered her close, answering her in a soothing whisper as if she were a distraught child. "The answers might not be in the watchers' books, but that doesn't mean we can't get them. We can do this. We're meant to get through this. Ain't no force in the world strong enough to take what we've got away from us."

Buffy made a small noise that was half sob and half hiccup and Spike swept her into his arms. His gaze met Faith's and then dropped from her face to the axe she carried before travelling back up. The darker slayer stood and slotted the axe's handle into Spike's pocket before he carried Buffy from the room.

"We just need to do this our way..." the vampire reassured her.

Buffy was vaguely aware that Spike wasn't heading in the direction of their room but, right then, she couldn't bring herself to care where he was taking her. It was only when she realised that he seemed to have made certain preparations that she began to pay more attention to her surroundings. Spike laid her gently onto a two foot high stack of thick exercise mats and placed the axe by her side before he made his way back up the basement stairs, closing the door at the top and locking it.

Candles burned in holders on every second step and every foot or so around the edge of the room, which was still almost bare except for the mats and the chains in the centre of the floor.

The vamp let his duster slide slowly down his arms to drape itself over the concrete floor as he prowled back to his woman. "You know what we have to do... don't you?" he asked in a rasping whisper, listening to the acceleration of Buffy's pulse as he crawled along the length of her prone body to look into her eyes.

For just a fraction of a second, the slayer's expression bespoke the same confusion and frustration that had marred the meeting upstairs. Then, she realised the full significance of the territorial gleam in the vamp's eyes. Although he was still holding himself in check, the tiny hairs on the back of Buffy's neck prickled their awareness of a nearby predator. Suddenly, Buffy knew that she didn't have to wait helplessly for Caleb's next move while her wedding day drew closer. She knew that there was one avenue of enquiry that had yet to be explored, one that was only open to her and her mate and one that had the potential to be a lot more exciting than reading any of Giles' dry old books. With that knowledge Buffy felt the power grow within her, as if her feelings of helplessness had stifled it like an oxygen starved fire that now roared into a beautiful and deadly inferno.

She reached up and gripped the neckline of Spike's T-shirt in both her hands, ripping it apart as if it were as easily torn as wet tissue paper. "I know what we have to do," she responded, her eyes bright with an inner light. She savoured the vampire's feral grin, their gazes locked on each other, as she slipped free of her shoes and curled her legs up between them. Instead of letting her knees drop to one side or wrapping her legs around Spike's waist, she pushed out against his solar plexus with a strength that launched him backward several feet.

She rose from the makeshift bed and shucked off the shirt that covered her strappy top before she picked up the axe.

Spike grinned his approval from where he was sprawled on the concrete floor, trying to regain the breath that he no longer needed. He pulled the shredded cloth from his torso. "Come on, kitten," he urged as he rose to his feet and beckoned her on. "You know I like a bit of rough and tumble."

Buffy sauntered cockily towards him, holding the axe loosely in one hand as she closed the gap, but her first quip was cut short as Spike drove a shoulder into her stomach and propelled her back onto the mats.

He reached up and tore aside the thin fabric that covered her torso.

Buffy's bared breasts heaved up and down, holding the vampire transfixed as she gasped for the air he had driven from her body. That lapse of concentration was all that the slayer needed and she rolled them both until she looked down on her mate, the wooden point of the axe's handle pressed against the pale skin over his heart. "You're going to reach down very slowly... You wouldn't want to do anything that just might make me slip, and you're going to take off those jeans you're wearing."

Spike raised his hands and moved them unhurriedly down to his belt buckle, sliding the leather end free of its belt loops and unfastening it with a rattle that was so familiar that it alone caused Buffy's stomach muscles to tighten and her heart to race. Quick as a striking rattlesnake, his arm swept the axe to the side, leaving a livid pink scratch across his chest, and sending the weapon flying from Buffy's grip.

Buffy immediately tumbled into a roll, snatching the weapon from the floor as she moved. She was surprised when she turned to face the vampire once again, to find that he was kicking off his boots.

Button by button he undid the flies of his jeans and pushed the heavy cotton down his legs, before stepping free of it. "All you had to do was ask, gorgeous. 'Sides, they were gettin' a mite restrictive."

Buffy found herself unable to resist staring at his swaying cock, fascinated by the way it brushed against the rippling muscles of his stomach as he swaggered naked towards her. The balance of power had shifted again and she was once more hunted instead of hunter... not that it really mattered since in this game they both came out as winners.

"Your turn, spitfire, unless you plan to go back to our room with your arse showin' later..." Spike raised an eyebrow as he slowly but inexorably closed the gap between them. He reached out and pulled the axe from Buffy's suddenly nerveless fingers and hurled it backhanded across the room so that the blade buried itself horizontally in the plaster and lath wall above the mats. The thin fabric of Buffy's low-riding trousers tore easily, as he shredded them and her panties with the same economy of movement, every sensual action speaking of raw animal power constrained, and Buffy eagerly kicked her way free of the remnants.

"You really do think you're God's gift, don't you?" she asked more from reflex than from any desire or power or rapidly receding concept of rational thought. Grabbing the vampire by his forearms and swinging him around she pushed him back against the wall. An instant later her naked body crashed into his, her mouth claiming his with mounting ferocity, before she in turn was picked up, and her back smashed against the wall.

"Know you are," the vamp hissed against her ear in reply. Only the pressure of Spike's body pinning her against the wall kept Buffy from slipping down. Then, cool hands slipped between her thighs and guided her legs around his waist and conflict evaporated into co-operation as they drove toward their mutual goal.

Wrapping her arms around his neck, she raised herself up until she felt the tip of his dick brushing against the damp folds of her sex. She slammed home, her eyes widening in momentary pain and short-lived satisfaction at the sudden penetration before she began to raise and lower herself in a deliberate rhythm.

Spike gripped his lower lip between his teeth and, focusing on that minor pain instead of physical pleasure of their joining or the primal feelings of desire, joy and power that coursed through their shared bond, he managed to stagger his way from the basement's side wall, to the end wall and finally to the mats in the corner before he let them tumble over. Buffy's body landed under his, the momentum of their fall driving them together with a force that sent tremors through both their bodies. The vampire guided Buffy's hands to where the axe was embedded in the wall above her head before he let the tide of their emotions carry him away.

Her fingers slipped naturally around the wood, one hand grasping the grip behind the gleaming axe head, the other wrapping around the stake-like handle, her knuckles whitening as she pressed back against the axe to stop Spike's pounding thrusts from driving her further and further up the mats. She revelled in the ferocity of their mating, the channeled violence calling to the primitive inside her in a way their more gentle lovemaking never could and she began to feel the first tremors in her muscles even before Spike's head dropped to nuzzle at her claim mark.

"Change... Spike," she gasped with the little air that she seemed to have left to her. She felt the pressure build in the pit of her stomach as clearly as she felt his shifting bones pressing against her neck.

The vampire lifted his head for long enough to claim a scorching kiss, sharp teeth leaving cuts in each of their tongues though Buffy was too lost to the pleasure to notice such a minor pain.

Instead she whimpered at the loss when he dropped his head to her neck once more.

His teeth pierced deep into her flesh, and as he drew the first mouthful of blood from her veins she plunged over the edge.

She screamed out his name as his seed spilled inside her and while the echoes of her cry still reverberated off the walls, she fastened her mouth over the area where Spike's neck and shoulder met and bit down until the copper taste of her mate's blood filled her mouth, mingling with the taste of her own.

"Mine," Spike growled by her ear, his hips moving more slowly against hers now, grinding firmly against her at the end of every stroke and setting off aftershocks that made Buffy's whole body quiver.

"Yours... always," Buffy replied as he began to lick closed the wound on her neck. "Mine?" she asked, nipping playfully at one of the vamp's earlobes as he finally stilled.

"'Til the end of the world, princess."

Buffy lowered her arms, dropping them over Spike's head and letting them rest against his back as the visions began to overtake them both. It was much later, when the flashes of the future had long since faded into an exhausted sleep, which in turn had given way to a hazy languor, that she realised that she still held the axe.

 

---

 

Penelope's eyes went to Giles as she felt the floor move beneath her feet. "Is that an earthquake?" she asked with a slight tremor in her voice as she mentally measured the distance between herself and the nearest doorway.

Giles barely glanced up from the book on the desk in front of him. "I'd like to think so," he replied.

"Couldn't it have some paranormal significance? Wasn't there an earthquake when The Master was released?" Penny asked.

Wes smiled at Giles' obvious reluctance. "I suspect we'd find the disturbance too localised to qualify as an earthquake. Let's just say that, when it comes to Spike and Buffy, talk about the earth moving isn't always hyperbole."

"Oh!" Wes's mother flushed a delicate shade of pink.

"But if we're lucky then, yes, it will have some paranormal significance."

Wes grinned when Penny's eyes widened even further as she realised exactly what was taking place beneath their feet. "Does Quentin know that they're mated?"

"Funnily enough, we've never got around to asking him. We were a little disappointed when he sent an assassin as his engagement present so we didn't mention it to him," her son remarked.

The library doors pushed open just at that moment, framing Quentin Travers as he rubbed at a large bump on his head. "Was that an earthquake?" the council head asked.

Penny raised her eyes heavenward as if in exasperation. "It is Southern California, Quentin. What did you expect?"

 

---

 

 

Buffy unclenched stiff fingers and let the axe slide to the floor beside the mats. When her gaze returned to her fiancé she found his eyes still sleepy but open and watching her in turn.

He wrapped his arms around her and rolled them both so that his weight no longer pinned her though neither of them made any move to separate their joined bodies. "Love you," he whispered at her ear, though the words were superfluous in their shared afterglow.

"Love you, too, smarty-pants," Buffy half-sighed. "But I don't know why you couldn't think of this days ago," she added, giving him a gentle prod in the chest.

"Wasn't sure how you'd take to gettin' hitched with fresh fang marks on your neck. Thought I'd let the council of wankers have a try."

"I suppose I should get dressed and go tell Giles, and then we can try to find that place."

"Where's the hurry, love? In case you didn't notice it was dark in that vision, an' I reckon if it wasn't meant to be somethin' for us both to do, they'd have found the answer in one or other of their books by now. Just like you an' the jailbird were meant to find the thing, you an' me are meant to find out what you do with it."

"But, Spike," Buffy pleaded as she widened her eyes disingenuously. "There must be hours before it'll get dark. Whatever will we do?"

"So what's this aunt of yours like?" Spike asked as he tugged slightly on where his hand was joined with Buffy's to draw her off to the left of their previous path.

Buffy shrugged. "Okay, I guess."

"So, if worst comes to worst, she'll cope with all the drama?"

"If you mean will she wig if Caleb turns up at the church with a bunch of his hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil monkies, you bet she will... She's not from Sunnydale. She doesn't know that you're meant to ignore these things."

"But she's your mum's sister, right? She'll swing an axe and take care of herself if push comes to shove?" His gaze travelled to the gleaming weapon that Buffy clasped in her other hand.

"I guess... But she's not going to have to... Right? 'Cause we're going to get this all sorted out before she gets here."

"Course we are, kitten," Spike answered as he pushed open a wrought iron gate swathed in dead vines at the graveyard's boundary. "You didn't see any bad guys muckin' things up when we were dancin' in that first vision we had, did you? And now they're pointin' us where we have to go to get everythin' all tied up in a nice pretty bow before your family get here. Can't go wrong when we're gettin' hints like that, can we?" He nodded toward the small pyramid that stood before them. "Told you I'd seen it before."

Buffy paused to look at the Egyptian-style engraving that had been gouged into the lintel above the blackened iron door. A reddish brown disc was centred in a pair of outstretched wings.

"The Winged Sun Disc," Spike's soft tones informed her, as if he had heard her unanswered question.

Buffy twisted to face him and raised an eyebrow. "A hint as to what it means might be more useful."

Spike shrugged. "Take your pick. Some reckon it's to do with rebirth an' the way Isis and Nephthys brought Osiris back to life. Some say it's a sign for Horus, the sun god... that he commanded Thoth, the god of knowledge, that it should be brought into every sanctuary to all the gods to drive out evil. Others reckon it symbolises air and it's used when you want to invoke the protection of the sylphs. The Masons used it as a sign for Jesus.

'For behold the day cometh, that shall burn as an oven; and all the proud, yea, and all that do wickedly, shall be stubble: and the day that cometh shall burn them up, saith the Lord of hosts, that it shall leave them neither root nor branch.

But unto you that fear my name shall the Sun of righteousness arise with healing in his wings; and ye shall go forth, and grow up as calves of the stall.

And ye shall tread down the wicked; for they shall be ashes under the soles of your feet in the day that I shall do this, saith the Lord of hosts.'

The Rosicrucians used it as a symbol of 'The Golden Age'. Same as the Egyptian myth, with the Gods coming back to rule over the earth in person and everythin' being all rosy an' bright, but the Christian version. Then some clever Dick decided that the sun god and Satan were the same thing an' some of these lots gave up on usin' it. Had it removed from all their stuff. Like I say, take your pick."

"Are you sure you weren't a watcher before you were turned?" Buffy asked and Spike released her hand, whether from disgust at her suggestion, or to allow her to approach the door would have been anyone's guess, if not for the fact that their bond told her his offence was as false as the attempted scowl on his face.

"Just because you couldn't make ten minutes to check out what it had to say on the internet. Some of us would as soon not walk into a situation blind when we don't have to... though I reckon in this case I'm not much further forward.

Gave the place the once over when I was lookin' for the Gem of Amarra. Door wouldn't..." The vampire's jaw dropped as Buffy took one step back before kicking in the hefty metal door so hard that it flew off its hinges and went skidding down the steps behind it. "Budge an inch," Spike finished in an awed whisper, as he began to follow his mate down the staircase she had revealed.

 

---

 

Buffy stepped warily into the chamber of finished stone that they found at the bottom of the long stairway. Both her hands gripped the axe she carried, ready to put it to use at an instant's notice. A flaming torch was mounted on the wall at either side of the doorway where they entered and flames flickered in a shallow brazier at the other side of the room. Unless there was some magic at work, and Buffy conceded that there probably was, the torches would have burned out long ago without someone to attend them. She heard the change in Spike's step behind her as he moved from the stairway to the level surface of the room's floor and the scraping noise he made as he lifted one of the torches from its holder.

Buffy peered into the corners of the mostly bare room as Spike held the torch high. Jars and baskets were clustered in groups in each one as if banished as far out of the way as possible. The light fell upon a curtain of filmy gauze that screened off a corridor leading from the room, but before Buffy could reach it, the insubstantial barrier was pushed to either side and an old woman stepped into the room.

The woman's face was lined with the marks of great age and her skin had the transparent glow that Spike had once associated with the later stages of tuberculosis. Her hair was drawn away from her face, but then spilled past her shoulders in waves of pales grey, but her back was straight and her voice surprisingly strong as she greeted them. "I'd forgotten. I'd forgotten how young she would be. Comes from the waiting. The mind plays tricks." She nodded toward the axe that Buffy still held in both hands. "I see you've found our weapon."

"Well, technically, Faith found it, but close enough," Buffy answered. "Who are you?"

"One of many," the old woman replied before she seemed to reconsider. "Well. time was. Now I'm alone in the world."

Spike moved up to stand at the slayer's side. "I think she was looking for something a bit closer to plain English, pet."

Buffy gave the vampire a grateful smile. "So you're some kind of ghost?" she asked, her eyes travelling over the robes that the woman wore, pretty certain that no one with the woman's pale complexion had worn that style of clothing since before Columbus had sailed the ocean blue.

The woman gave a smile that came close to being a laugh. "No, I'm as real as you are. Just. well, let me put it this way... I look good for my age. I've been waiting." She held out both her hands, palms upward and without any further cue Buffy laid the weapon on them, earning a look of relief from the vampire when the woman's fingers were solid enough to prevent the blade from falling to the ground. "You pulled it out of the rock-."

"Agai-. Ow!" Buffy protested as Spike stood none too gently on her toe.

The woman seemed to wait for the pair to return their attention to her. "You pulled it out of the rock. I was one of those who put it in there."

Spike rolled his eyes. "Was a time when if someone took as long to tell me what I wanted to know as you are, I'd have been pullin' their fingernails out with pliers by now."

This time it was Buffy's turn to kick the vampire in the shins. "Rude much, Spike. Ignore the King of Instant Gratification, here... not that time isn't at a premium.

What is it?" she asked.

Again the woman smiled as if haste was something that had become little more than a vague memory. "A weapon. A scythe. Forged in secrecy for one like you who- I'm sorry. What's your name?"

"Buffy."

"No, really."

Spike smirked, earning himself a sidelong glare, but when Buffy shrugged the woman continued.

"We forged it in secrecy and kept it hidden from the Shadow Men who-."

"The who?" Buffy interrupted.

"Those who bound a demon into The First Slayer and bound her to the earth, forcing her to fight the creatures of darkness for them. Those who decreed that when she died the curse would fall upon another and when she died upon another and another. And they became the Watchers and the Watchers watched the Slayers. but we were watching them."

Spike's nose twitched slightly. "So you're like the Internal Affairs of the demon world?" He reached out and roughly grabbed the woman's arm, pulling her away from the curtain and propelling her halfway across the room. He grabbed the axe with his newly free hand in the instant he let the old woman go, tossing it back to Buffy and backing off until he was close enough to take the woman by the hand again. It all happened in just a fraction of a second but Buffy was ready and waiting for Caleb when he ripped down the semi-transparent curtain.

"You went and ruined my dramatic entrance. It was a real heartstopper," he accused Spike.

"This thing?" Buffy asked, her question aimed at the ancient, though she never took her gaze from the man before her. "This is what we needed to hurt this guy, right? That's why he wants it so bad. Because it can stop him?"

Caleb made a grab for the axe, but Buffy refused to relinquish her grip, gritting her teeth with the effort as he lifted her from the ground.

Her foot lashed out, a wickedly pointed boot catching him on the kneecap and Buffy found herself standing on solid ground once more. She swung out and hit her opponent on the side of the head with the stake-like end of the axe, drove the tip of the blade into his gut as if it were an old fashioned can opener and then she drew the weapon back, slashing across his body with the width of the lethally sharp blade.

"It's the only thing that can truly hurt him." The woman gasped as Spike jerked her sideways and stepped around her, just in time to drive a knee into Caleb's gut as the cleric grasped at the wall for support, the ferocity of his lunge for the old woman having driven his fist through a foot thick stone pillar and bringing the column crashing down in a cloud of dust.

Spike darted backward before The First's priest could make a grab for him, but Buffy brought the axe blade smashing down into Caleb's lower back as he moved to straighten up.

She gave a smug grin as he slumped to the ground, his spine obviously severed and a huge gash exposed as his fall ripped the blade from his flesh. The smile faded as the man's bones began to knit together before their eyes. Buffy was so mesmerised by the rapidly healing damage that she failed to see the hand that shifted to grab her foot and yank it out from under her until Spike gave a belated warning.

"You must separate his head from his body or cleave his heart in two," the grey-haired woman called out.

"And you couldn't tell me this earlier?" Buffy asked before she rolled to her feet, taking a brief second to rub her bruised pride as Caleb also picked himself up off the floor.

"Can't you see, girl?" The preacher's drawl was as patronising as ever. "You can't stop me. I can just keep going back for more. It's like being reborn."

Buffy lashed out with the axe aiming for Caleb's neck, but this time he seemed to be playing things slightly more warily.

He ducked under the blow, avoiding contact, but Buffy continued on the offensive, swinging, slicing and thrusting. Caleb seemed to effortlessly evade every attack and Spike had his hands full just keeping the old woman out of the way of both combatants.

When their circling finally brought the vampire back to the stairway, he pushed the old woman toward the steps. "Get out. Hide. I'll track you when we finish with Pat Robertson, here."

"I can't..."

Spike barely registered the old woman's words as he watched the former clergyman draw Buffy into what his instincts screamed was a trap.

All Caleb's weaving and dodging had ceased. He smiled and stood upright presenting himself as a perfect target. Too perfect.

Buffy swung the axe in what would have been a beheading blow.

Without even a sideways glance, Caleb's hand darted out and grabbed the axe-shaft in mid-swing, stopping it cold. In that instant his other fist crashed into Buffy's jaw so hard that she flew backward into the opposite wall, the impact raising a cloud of dust and numbing Buffy's arm from the elbow down, so that the axe tumbled from her fingers.

Spike stepped forward and swung the torch he carried like a club. The blow was hard enough that the torch broke in two, its flame doused as the top half rolled on the dusty floor.

Caleb gave a howl of pain and frustration as Buffy reached the axe, grabbed it and flipped back to her feet.

Spike threw down the splintered wood in his hand and grabbed the other torch from the wall. "What the hell do you mean you can't?" he yelled, rounding on the old woman who had climbed no more than half a dozen steps, as Buffy and the preacher battled on.

"I can't leave the pyramid. My life has been extended by years beyond number but if I leave the shelter of Isis's sanctuary then time will have its due."

"All you had to say was you'll die if you leave," Spike growled, seemingly allowing his impatience with the old woman's long-winded speeches to distract him from the fight. However, when Caleb found the vampire's turned back to be too tempting a target, Spike's back kick demonstrated that appearances could be deceptive, connecting crunchily with the preacher's kneecap before he was close enough to land a punch. Even with his back turned, Spike could see every move through Buffy's eyes. He had deliberately offered himself up to allow Buffy a breathing space from Caleb's relentless assault.

"Just keep her safe, Spike. This is my deal." Buffy sounded tired, but there was a determination in her voice that he was familiar with.

He gave a curt nod. He knew that sometimes there were things you just had to do on your own. He took a few steps back into the stairwell. "He's all yours, starshine."

"We need talk."

"Hmm." It took Giles a few moments to draw his mind away from the research that had him engrossed and process that it was he to whom Lily was speaking. "What is it?"

"Not here. Must talk alone." The demoness turned her back on him and strode from the library. She plainly didn't even consider the possibility that Giles would choose not to follow her.

With a sigh, the watcher ripped a sheet from the pad he was using to make his notes and bookmarked his place before he jogged after her.

"Lily, if this is what I think it is, I really think we already have the best candidate available."

Lily frowned at Giles, making him feel like he was once more in primary three and being reprimanded by his teacher because he wouldn't tell how his glasses had become broken and his knuckles bruised.

It hadn't mattered then that he knew that eventually someone would put together the bruises on the bully's face and those on his fists. The boy had been in another class, one two years above his own, and Rupert would not be the one to tell tales. No more now could he tell Lily what she wanted to hear.

She made her way to the kitchen and out through the school's back door, taking a path that curved around the back of the conservatory and into what once long ago had been the formal gardens, now a tangled mass of weeds and straggly plants and hedges. She took a seat on one of the old marble benches and looked up at the moon while she waited for Giles to join her.

"Is my task," Lily informed him in a tone that brooked no argument, waiting no more than a heartbeat after he had taken a seat beside her.

Giles paused as if trying to think of a diplomatic way to phrase his answer. "Whoever wears the amulet must be of superhuman strength. We cannot risk the possibility that the bearer will be exhausted before the amulet's work is done."

"Pfff!" Lily fixed him with her red-tinted eyes that paradoxically seemed both alien and motherly. "There is strength enough in these old bones, and more in this heart, to do what must be done. Is not the muscles that will be tested but the spirit.

I old woman, but is why it should be me. I had good life. Now Clem happy and Marie and Rosa happy, is not big thing for me to go be with my husband and my little Thomas. Is fitting. Who is better?" She cast the watcher a sidelong glance as she asked what she clearly regarded as a rhetorical question.

"Is no good to curse William," she announced unequivocally. "We no have a century for him to sulk like grandsire and your slayer, she no never no more look at you again like father if you take him. Is breaking her heart if no wedding."

"I had already ruled out Spike. As you say, the results of the ensouling spell would make him too unpredictable to be a viable subject."

"Ha Nath, she volunteer..." Lily was obviously fishing, her gaze fixed on the watcher, but, other than a distant sadness and a deep-seated guilt, which she attributed to the fact that he was the one who must play god and decide to whom the task should be assigned, she could pick up nothing of the watcher's emotions.

"Yes, she did... as did a number of others including your son." The watcher gave a sigh. "I wish I could reassure you but I swore that the person in question could retain their anonymity until the time for action was here. If I begin to rule the others out then you will simply keep going until there is only one possibility left. My choice, however, is already made."

Lily gave a snort of disgust. "You no father, so you no know... no really. Maybe you have tiny idea. Maybe you love your slayer so you know little what is like to see someone make her happy. Maybe you imagine what is like if you watch her from baby, if you no wait till she is woman-child to love her, if you belong to her from her first breath. Maybe then you try harder again and think what it like if you no just see her happy, if you feel it inside when she smile or laugh or it tear you apart when she lonely and you maybe begin understand what is like for empath to be parent.

Is no right that a mother should bury all her children. Is not as should be. Clem, he in love. If you take him away, then will break old woman's heart, but is for Rosa, I will curse your name. She no need lose uncle and father." Her warning seemed matter of fact, as if she didn't really think that Giles would call on Clem but she was making her position known. Then, she continued, her voice chill.

"But if you take from him his happiness. If you are choosing Ha Nath, then you be doubly cursed. I no stand by and look. Ha Nath, she no nothing to you. She stranger. You maybe think she no matter-."

"I assure you-." Giles' indignation at the mere suggestion that he might be biased by his own emotional attachments boiled through instantly.

"Is only human," the old demon replied, cutting him off before he could go further and her tone became almost sly. "Same if choosing were mine and I not so old, I choose werewolf. I say is for the best. Is not good for him to stay now mate is dead... but is really because he stranger, because it no hurt my heart if he die."

"Oz is young. He'll find someone else."

"Oz is wolf. When the witch die, his heart die, too."

There was a certainty to her tone that made the watcher want to weep for the stoic young man. "Surely-."

"Is not in his nature to love another. Even so, is better that burden fall to one who old, who have family waiting for her on other side." The empath gave a satisfied smile as she felt the deep confusion that Giles kept hidden beneath the mask of self-discipline into which he schooled his features. When the conversation had begun, Giles had been resolute. Now, he was undecided. It was a start. "The children, they all have much left to do... Is not fair to ask this of any of them." Lily pushed herself to her feet and slowly made her way back toward the school, her gait slightly stiff as a result of the cold seeping into her bones.

Giles watched her go and wondered how the old woman had managed to cloud an issue which had seemed so clear cut before. He tried to convince himself that his reasoning was just as sound tonight as it had been when the choice was first made, if it could really ever have been called a choice. Somehow, even with all the facts at his disposal, he only partially succeeded.

 

---

 

Caleb kicked out with his legs, unseating Buffy from her position over him and throwing her several feet to the side. He jumped to his feet in an instant and, as Buffy staggered tiredly to her own, he drove his fist into her face. The blow sent her stumbling backward and the preacher followed her, hitting her again and again until he had driven her back against one of the walls, but Buffy refused to give up the axe.

The cleric's eyes glowed with an unholy joy as he gave vent to his misogynistic fury, finally beating down the whore who had humiliated him over and over since he had come to Sunnydale. "You know, this is no one's fault but your own. You could have stood back and let us take care of business." As if to demonstrate the point he stepped back, smiling at the way Buffy seemed to be curling in on herself. He gesticulated as if he were using his hands to illustrate a sermon. "You didn't have to interfere, but like every woman back through to Eve you had to stick your nose in where it wasn't wanted or needed."

Buffy charged at him, but Caleb sidestepped out of the way and used her momentum to his advantage, half tripping and half throwing her so that she landed flat on her back on what appeared to be a stone altar. Buffy kicked out as he approached and connected hard with his stomach, but it earned her only a brief reprieve before he scooped her into his arms and threw her into another of the columns that Buffy hoped weren't load-bearing. The stone shattered as her back impacted with it, bringing the column toppling around her as she fell dazed to the floor and the axe slipped from her fingers.

Caleb bent down and lifted the axe from the ground, and there was nothing Buffy could do to prevent him.

Her head pounded and her thoughts were fogged as if she had been ripped from a deep sleep. In her head, two words repeated over and over again. Get up. Get up. Get up. Feeling almost like a puppet, being dragged around by strings that someone else manipulated, she began to struggle to her feet. She was only dimly aware of Caleb, once again going for the gloat instead of the kill as he twirled the axe in his hands.

"I was kinda hopin' it'd go this way." He raised the axe over his head for a two-handed blow, knowing that all the fight had been beaten from his opponent and that all he had to do was administer the final killing blow. The vampire hadn't even moved from his position guarding the stairway. He didn't even appear to want to intervene. "First I get rid of you. Then your pet vampire. And then I take out the second string batter and all the little girls." He brought the axe down hard and too fast for Buffy to move aside.

Buffy's hands moved up to meet the axe as it fell. The strength she needed came partly from rage at the idea he would dare to threaten Spike. The remainder seemed to flow into her as if it had been willed there. It brought the same feeling of being home that she felt when she awoke wrapped in her lover's arms. The axe stopped dead, and then, infinitely slowly, she twisted her grip until the axe head pointed not at her, but at the former minister. She stamped sharply on the pastor's instep and in the instant that the pain caused his concentration to waver she drove the axe forward, smashing it into Caleb's face.

The preacher's grip loosened and Buffy pirouetted gracefully, bringing the axe round in a complete circle. The blade sliced cleanly through the hand that Caleb held up to stop the blow and then bit deeply into his neck. Black ichor flowed from the wound and leaked from every available orifice as the man slumped to the ground.

Buffy raised the axe, and drove it through what remained of Caleb's neck as if she were chopping firewood. She kicked the head to one side, making sure it was completely severed and flicked the axe so that the liquid ran off its blade.

"So... You watch the watchers?" she asked the old woman as if their conversation had never been interrupted. Spike met her halfway across the room, pulling her in against his side, and she wrapped her free hand around his waist, using it for support as the strength she had borrowed ebbed away. "But who are you?"

"Guardians," the woman answered. "Women who want to help and protect you. We forged the blade centuries ago, halfway around the world."

"Hence the Luxor Casino theme," Buffy theorised.

"Forged there, it was put to use right here… to kill the last pure demon that walked upon the earth," the weapon's guardian supplied as she settled herself upon the next to bottom step on the stairway. "The rest were already driven under. And then there were men here, and then there were monks. And then there was a town… and now there is you. And the scythe remained hidden."

Buffy frowned, unsure whether her confusion were natural or the result of one of the recent blows Caleb had inflicted. "I don't understand. How is it possible that we didn't know any of this?"

The woman's shoulders barely moved in a near imperceptible shrug. "We hid, too. We had to until now. We're the last surprise."

The weariness began to fade from Buffy's face, replaced by hope. "Does this mean we can win?"