Fumbling Towards Ecstasy

Spike’s comments regarding the world’s impending doom didn’t seem to receive what the vampire considered to be due attention from the older of the two watchers. This was mainly because he was somewhat preoccupied by what he could see through the still open front door to the house.

He managed to last until Wes removed his helmet, before aghast, he removed his glasses to clean them.

"Wesley?" He imbued the other watcher’s name with such utter incredulity that Spike couldn’t control a smirk.

"Hey," the slayer teased. "If you could be a closet mod jogger, what makes you think Wes wouldn’t make a biker. You had your secrets…"

Spike snorted his amusement at a mental image of Giles perched atop an over-laden Vespa wearing an olive drab parka with The Who’s logo on the back, but didn’t say anything.

"That can’t be Wesley Wyndam-Pryce!" Giles replaced his glasses, only to confirm that his view was unchanged, except that the object of his amazement was now making his way through the doorway.

"Yes, well. Up until this morning, I was." The watcher looked uncomfortable, almost as if he was looking round the hallway for listening devices.

Buffy quickly came to the rescue. "Spike’s been busy stocking up the fridge with bottles of some beer or other for him and Wesley. What say we relieve him of a few and go make use of that garden furniture out back for once?"

Spike gave another snort. "I think on your track record you better stick to the Budweiser, pet. Newkie Brown’s for the grown ups, love. Just because Clint Eastwood imports it by the crate, doesn’t mean the rest of you Yanks are up to it."

"Well seein’ as how he makes Rupes here look like a spring chicken, I’ve got no doubt that you could beat him to a pulp, but I bet he could drink you under the table without even trying, besides…" the vampire bent over to whisper in his fiancée’s ear.

"Ew, Spike! Gross." Buffy slapped the platinum blond in the stomach hard enough to produce a startled exhalation of air.

"Giles, come and provide me with some civilised conversation." Buffy tugged her father figure off towards the back door.

Wesley hung back until Spike recovered from the blow, hanging his jacket up in the meantime. "What on earth did you say to her?"

Spike smirked. "I told her if she tried to keep up with us drinking that stuff she’d have the shits for a week."

"Well, if I’d said for a day she’d probably have tried anyway, on principle, and I’m already sharin’ out what I bought for the two of us between three. If she was drinkin’ it as well, it wouldn’t last no time. Not to mention it’s kind of hard to keep an eye on Bit if I spend all night in the bathroom holdin’ Buffy’s head while she throws her guts up."

Wes shook his head. "I guess I won’t be taking the Harley home tonight, then."

"Probably not. Well, we best go raid the fridge and then see what brings the watcher all the way from the Georgian terraces of historic Bath." He gave Wes an appraising look. "Not to mention what happened to bring you clear across town." Spike shifted through to the kitchen with Wes following. He cleared up the broken pieces of a bowl, picked up a half-empty pint beer bottle from the counter and extracted another two similar but full ones from the fridge along with a bottle of Bud lite. He pulled out a tray and placed the bottles and four half-pint glasses on it.

"Yes, well I suspect that Giles’ news may be rather more urgent," Wes admitted, as they moved to join the slayer and her former watcher, giving the older watcher his second shock of the day.

"S-spike!" Giles’ eyes widened as he watched the vampire approach across the lawn.

"Yeah?" the vampire pretended ignorance of what was freaking the watcher out, even as he took a seat in the sun next to his fiancée, passing out the full bottles of beer and keeping the half full one for himself.

"Funnily enough, I was actually aware of that little detail. Nice, isn’t it? Kind of handy when social services comes to visit tomorrow, too. I figure once that’s out the way I’ll have to hand them back, though."

"Well, considerin’ you were the first one to start hollerin’ about invulnerability you took a while to work that out.

So, Rupert, You’ve got a beer. Give it half an hour and you’ll get some dinner. Let’s skip the rest of the make nice bollocks an’ get to the point. What dire catastrophe brings you rushing from the motherland?"

"There’s actually a couple of things…" Giles addressed his answer not to the questioner but to Buffy. "Firstly, and arguably most importantly, there’s a coven based in Devon that I’ve had dealings with since I returned home…"

Even though they weren’t physically touching, Spike picked up on the disappointment and hurt that Buffy felt when Giles described England as his home. Giles carried on oblivious.

"They haven’t been able to come up with any detail, but they have some gifted prognosticators and it would appear that a dark power is about to rise in Sunnydale." Giles removed his glasses, rubbing at them again with his handkerchief before replacing them.

"Secondly, news of your engagement has somehow reached the ears of Quentin Travers. A friend who still works for the council says he’s determined that the wedding won’t go ahead. I have no idea what form his intervention may take. He may try sending a special ops squad. He may simply have Spike deported, or he may arrive on your doorstep with another of his delegations."

"He can’t do that. No one and no thing is going to stop this wedding. This is going to be my special day." Spike reached an arm around Buffy to gently stroke her back trying to soothe her, as she became more irate. "What gives him the right to be arbiter of our lives? Who does he think he is to interfere with our wedding? What have we done to him?"

"Actually…" Wesley interrupted, "I think you may find that Spike at least has actually given him some provocation."

"No," agreed Wesley. "So far as I’m aware you never have. Nevertheless, you did briefly make the acquaintance of his grandfather, one Harold Travers. It was admittedly a rather brief meeting. You remember visiting London, 1940?"

"He’s saying that Travers’ grandpa was one of a bunch of Watchers that me and Dru killed one time when we paid a visit to Wanker Central."

"Of course!" Giles muttered. "I’d heard the stories, but it was so long ago, I never put it together that it was you."

Wesley shrugged. "There was a girl training as a watcher the same time I was. She wrote-."

"Wrote her thesis on me," Spike finished for him in an almost bored tone of voice.

"Well, when I was first assigned here, in light of your time here the year before, I checked out a copy. It was quite fascinating, as a matter of fact."

"Hey, don’t I get a copy?" Buffy asked. "No fair with the Council knowing more about my husband than I will. And how come you knew about this?" she asked as she turned to her fiancé.

"Well, it was you that sent the dizzy bint and her crossbow wielding cronies to the crypt to bat her eyelashes at me an’ get her tweed knickers all wet."

"What? ‘S not like I encouraged her." He gave a smirk. "If I’d been interested, I doubt I’d’ve had to."

Giles gave an impatient sigh. "I think we’re getting side-tracked here. I think the more immediate threat is that represented by whatever the coven predicted. As Spike pointed out earlier, while he is in possession of the orbs he is invulnerable, so whatever Quentin may try his life is under no immediate threat."

"Okay, watcher, we’ll take this ‘dark power’ seriously when you tell us what you’re hiding?"

"You did. No sooner did you spit out the little line than the glasses were off and you were tryin’ to wear a hole in them. A convenient little trick for when you don’t want to look people in the eye, isn’t it? So spill, Rupes. What do you know?"

"I don’t know anything," Giles stated firmly. "I’m merely concerned as to one of the possibilities."

Spike’s thoughts flicked back to an argument that he and Buffy had overheard one night when they were on the back porch.

"He’s trying to avoid saying that this is the sort of thing that might be the result of a lot of magic…" Spike answered.

Giles’ beer suddenly seemed to demand a lot of his attention. "It is simply one possibility, Buffy."

"You think Willow’s this ‘dark power’?" she asked, apparently dumbfounded.

"Or she may inadvertently raise it…" Giles admitted. "But it’s no more than a hunch. Not even that really, more like a bad feeling. It’s probably just paranoia."

"Or you could view it as the answer to the questions, ‘Who has enough power to do something like this?’ and ‘Who’s arrogant enough to play with those sort of forces?’" Spike suggested. "I think the world is safe for tonight, though. She’s meant to be meeting Glinda in the library.

"I’m afraid my news isn’t anything like so dramatic. Just that I think I’ve found somewhere to live and in all probability run the agency from, though there’s a bit more paperwork to do on that."

"I should be able to sign the lease tomorrow morning, but I wanted to make sure none of you would object to a new neighbour…"

"Across the road. The old Kalish place." Spike looked blank. "The house where you smashed in the window last night."

"Wes, that’s great. You’ll be right across the street if we need you… and vice versa. And we’ll be so close by, any time you feel like company you can just pop over."

"Not to mention giving me a bolt hole for when the oestrogen levels over here get too much to bear," Spike joked.

"Hey," exclaimed the slayer. "You love it round here. You know you do. You think you’re Hugh Hefner."

"Have you guys all gone deaf?" called a voice from the porch and Dawn appeared around the corner of the house carrying the handset for the cordless phone. "I’m supposed to be the invalid here, not the servant."

"Sorry, pet. I was going to head back in in five minutes to finish off in the kitchen."

"Yeah? Well, you’ve got quarter of an hour to get it all under control before you go to pick up Brandon." She passed the phone to Buffy. "It’s Anya, something to do with Tara and Willow. She asked if I knew where Wes was as well, but since I didn’t realise we were having an English embassy tea-party on the back lawn, I told her I didn’t know."

"Willow never showed up to meet Tara. She rang me to see if Willow had taken anything from the magic shop. She thinks she’s going to try to use that forgetting spell to make us forget that she sent the email to Sam, and to make Dawn forget what happened to her."

"You mean, she wouldn’t mess with people’s brains again without their permission after her delusting spell and her will be done spell and her making Tara forget about them arguing and then making us all forget who we were and then conjuring demons and grand theft auto by magic. No, of course she wouldn’t. What was I thinking? Willow’s your friend. Of course, she wouldn’t endanger us all. Again."

"Well, not that it’s much of a hope, but if we split up someone may be able to find her and try to talk her out of it. Of course if we’re all over the place when our memories go then it’s even more dangerous, but Tara’s got no hope of getting back here to get the ingredients she’d need to do a locator spell in time. So for now she’s checking some of the buildings on campus."

"Wes is here. So is Giles. If they met you at The Magic Box they could do it, couldn’t they?"

Giles? Wes? Anya and Tara say Willow never showed up to meet Tara this evening. They think she’s going to try to make us all forget about last night and that in a way it’s her fault."

"No, there has to be something else. Ask if she got any components?" Giles suggested.

"And there’s no way she’d be able to make everybody forget. We’re talking troops, doctors, nurses and then you’d have to get rid of all the physical records. X-rays, notes, bills… Red’s little trick wouldn’t cut it. ‘Sides, twice in one week is too much to expect anybody to put up with." Spike gave his opinion while Buffy questioned Anya.

"Just a big quartz. That’s why they thought it was the memory spell. They figured she probably took some Lethe’s bramble while Anya was busy with something else."

"Quartz? As in common ingredient between magic and watches?" Spike asked before Buffy could finish relaying what Anya had said to the two watchers. "Big as in big enough to use as an offering to some demon demi-god you might want to conjure up, if say you wanted them to take back time. There’s your dark bloody power. She’s not trying to make everybody forget. The stupid bint! She’s trying to make it never have happened."

Spike winced suddenly as Buffy’s arm impacted once more with his stomach. "You had to go and jinx us by saying we’d be safe for the night, didn’t you, Einstein?"

Up in the clock tower where Buffy and Riley had once fought The Gentlemen and their minions, Willow sat cross-legged with a ceremonial circle in front of her. Its design was complex and looked like a Celtic knot pattern, so that the single line in cobalt blue edged finely in the gold of yellow sandstone, circled the area which it bound, seven times over. It had taken her over an hour to draw, for the areas that represented where the line crossed under itself had to be represented precisely. The blue of the line’s centre had to meet the gold at the edge of the line it travelled under or the circle would be broken, overlap too far so the blue in one strand met the blue of the next and the circle’s potency would be reduced. The whole design was traced in sand. The same sand as would once have filled hourglasses. In the very centre of the circle sat the huge crystal of quartz so translucent you could almost see through it, about the size of a catcher’s mitt.

Between the witch and the circle were placed the spell book from which she had taken the design, several crystals and a freshly sharpened silver letter opener. The star garnets were for empowerment and productivity. They also represented glory, but Willow wouldn’t admit even to herself that she might use them thus as that would be contrary to the workings of white magic. The sulphur crystals were for wish empowerment, white stones with pale yellow pieces all through them, almost as if someone had taken a bag of sherbet lemons and crushed them before trying to glue the end product back together. The letter opener? Well…

Everything was ready. Willow simply meditated to clear her mind. She needed to dismiss the thought of the look on Tara’s face when she had first suggested that she take back time. She tried to forget the look of disappointment on her face when she told her about the email and the hurt, lost look on Dawn’s face when Spike and Buffy brought her back from the hospital.

Most of all, she tried to ignore the whining and the scrabbling that came from the now urine-stained cardboard box in the corner of the tower. After all, once the spell was cast, she would be totally blameless, because she literally wouldn’t have done anything.

"So who exactly do you think she’s going to try to summon?" Giles asked Spike.

The vampire turned on him irritably. "Do I look like the bloody watcher in the pack? I thought that was what you were here for? Better yet, ask demon bint. She’s been to half these places. Probably used to go to the same bloody parties as half the things Red might conjure up. Or maybe Tinkerbell’ll know what’s in the books they’ve got between them.

All I know is the so-called Master’s meant to have tried the like after that earthquake, an’ before they managed to send the bugger back where it came from the Brotherhood of Aurelius found themselves short a couple of dozen flunkies, Darla not included, unfortunately. Mind you, he was a soulless, evil, arrogant sociopath rather than just an amoral one, so at least he had an excuse.

Bit, go get dressed and when you’ve done that, come back down and bring your cell and an overnight bag, just in case. Quick as you can. Reckon as we’re goin’ to have to see if lover boy’s okay with a change of venue."

"Right, Giles, Wes, you get The Magic Box." Buffy fell into organising mode. "We’ll drop Dawn off and then head for Willow’s parents.

Anya, you’re at yours, right? I can’t think of anywhere else in town itself that we need to check and Giles can let him and Wes into the shop. So, if you can call Tara back and bring her up to date with what we think and then stay there for just now, you’re not too far from either the campus or the town once we have a definite location."

"Buffy, if you’re right, anything that would do what she wants… It’s going to want a sacrifice in return. That kind of magic can change someone. If you do find her she may not be the Willow you know."

"Okay, guys. More bad news. Anya says the spell would need a sacrifice. I’m guessing you guys all know more about the significance of that than I can tell you."

"Not so much, pet." Spike gave her an uncomfortable look. "Won’t bother her half as much this time as it did the first time around."

"I suppose I can’t say for certain, but you tell me anywhere you know where you can buy the blood of a pregnant doe? I mean, reckon there’s quite a few folk of the fanged variety would pay for a delicacy like that but I’ve never heard tell of anywhere sellin’ it. What about you, Rupes? You heard tell of anything like that, bein’ in the trade an’ all?"

Spike shrugged. "Like I said, second time’ll be easier, an’ if she thinks she can take that back along with everything else, she might not even think twice."

"You know they say there’s no such thing as a free ride, pet. If you’re talking about magic you can take that and double it. Actually, depending on the school of thought you can either triple it or multiply it by seven. Whatever stunt she pulls, it’ll come back on her."

"Then we’ve got to stop her before it gets that far." She looked over at the two watchers. "We’re waiting for Dawn. What’s your excuse? Call us as soon as you have a location."

Buffy and Spike drove away from Brandon and his father’s house having promised, if possible that they would be back to pick up Dawn at ten, otherwise they would ring to let her know what happened and pick her up at seven the next morning.

Spike shrugged. "What other spell of hers d’you think I’d bother to check out?"

Buffy sighed. "All the lines she’s crossed with her magic. They’re all my fault, from putting Angel’s soul back to ritual sacrifice. They’ve all been for me."

"Pet, the way I recall it, you were restin’ happily up in heaven. You didn’t ask her to do what she did. And if you want my opinion, that whole crock about thinkin’ you were in hell was just a smokescreen Red put up t’con the others into goin’ along with her.

I dunno, maybe by the time she got around to actually doin’ it she convinced herself as well. Thing is, are you tellin’ me a witch as smart as Red couldn’t have found a way to check? Are you tellin’ me someone that bright couldn’t figure out that dyin’ for your little sis and the rest of the world would get you a ticket to heaven, even if you hadn’t been an angel all along?" He gave her a flirtatious grin, trying to lighten the mood just a little.

"In my book Red brought you back for one reason. She thought bein’ the slayer was this great important destiny. Well, two reasons. Anyway, when she got left to run things she found out the difference between goin’ with you on an odd patrol and fightin’ the demon’s night after night and she didn’t want to carry that responsibility any more. She did it for her, not for you.

Y’know at the time I didn’t get why Red didn’t grieve, not after the first couple of days. Guess she just couldn’t take it, so she was plannin’ on bringin’ you back almost from the start. It was always all about her, pet.

Don’t you think that if she’d done it for you she’d have been there for you when you came back? Or that if she was worried about you that they’d have helped out on patrols to give you time to readjust? Or that maybe she could have paid a bit of extra rent and got an upgrade or something instead of a whole new laptop?

I know you hang onto those bloody ‘best friend’ labels. I’ll even admit with Harris he had good reason to be a bit preoccupied, an’ when all’s said an’ done if I got staked tomorrow it’d make me feel better to know he’d be around for you, even if I can’t stand the prick. All the same, it seems to me that the person who’s actually been your best friend for the last year, is the one you don’t bother givin’ the title to. An’ Red gets the credit, but I doubt she’s done anything to suit anybody but herself in a bloody long time."

Silence filled the car and Spike began to think he’d overstepped the mark. Just the same, the fact was whatever else came of this night’s events, the only way that Willow and Tara would still be a couple at the end of the night was if Willow succeeded in her goals and no one but her was ever any the wiser. This time, if Spike had any say in the matter, it would be the aggrieved party who got the support of her friends not the person who he considered was as guilty of rape for what she’d done to Tara as Sam was for what she’d done to Dawn.

Seconds ticked by and the overly tense muscles in Spike’s jaw ticked along with them. Then, Buffy’s fingers brushed against his face. In her touch, he could feel her regrets and her reluctance but also her understanding and her acceptance.

"You’re right. Last time this all fell to pieces, we none of us treated Tara as well as she deserved. I hope when this is over that she’ll choose to stay with us. Either way, I put Willow’s feelings over Dawn’s after the car wreck and I told myself she’d get over it. After this though, I just don’t think Dawn’s ever going to feel secure living in the same house as her. I’m not entirely sure I wouldn’t feel the same even if I didn’t have Dawn to consider. I think she has to leave."

Spike pulled the car over in front of Willow’s parents’ house and turned to take Buffy’s face in his hands.

"It’s your house, love, and whatever you decided I wouldn’t interfere, other than maybe to express an opinion, but I want you to know that I understand this was a hard decision for you. I’m proud of you for making it and I agree with you one hundred percent."

Buffy’s eyes were bright as she looked up into his. "That’s just it. It should be hard, but you know, it’s kind of not. Sometimes it’s like I don’t know her at all. Sometimes she scares me."

Spike pulled her into his arms, holding her close and under cover of the embrace, his light-fingered left hand slipped the orbs from his own pocket into Buffy’s.

"Sometimes she scares me, too, love," he whispered in her ear. "Sometimes she scares me, too."

As they pulled apart, Buffy looked the vampire in the eye. "You know, you make a lot bigger shield to hide behind than I do, and we still don’t know what Travers is up to."

"I’m still only worrying about staking, beheading, fire and sunlight. You could get hurt a whole pile of other ways."

Buffy sighed. "I suppose I’m just lucky that you waited till after sunset to be all chivalrous."

Spike gave a snort of amusement. "Chivalrous is one thing, pet. Suicidally stupid is another… Speaking of which, let’s go see if the red witch is making a parental visit."

Giles unfurled his arms from around Wesley’s waist, giving the bubble gum pink helmet the same disgusted look as he took it off as he had when Wesley had first passed him the monstrosity. ‘I knew I should have got a hire car,’ he told himself.

He found that the motions of opening up the store were no longer second nature to him. He had to think about which keys to use, and fumbled through fitting them to the locks. Once inside, everything was much as he remembered, however. Between the two of them they quickly found the relevant spell book and started pulling the required crystals and powders from the shelves.

"Do you really think we can do this in time to stop her?" Wesley asked the older watcher.

"Stop her turning back time, or stop her summoning something powerful enough to kill us all?" Giles asked.

Wesley looked the older watcher in the eye. "You know none of us believe that she can actually summon something that powerful and have enough power left to make it obey her."

"I’ll assume you meant the latter, then. Prophecies can be thwarted, but… in this case I have my doubts about it happening quite so conveniently," Giles explained even as he arrayed the spell components as shown in the book.

Several minutes later, Giles snuffed out the latest conflagration to take hold on the magic shop’s Sunnydale street map. The paper sheet looked as if it had long been owned by a group of particularly careless stoners, but only the latest "spliff burn" was of interest to the two watchers.

"You ring Anya," Wesley suggested. "I’ll call Tara. Whoever finishes first can get Buffy."

"I get the whole talking her out of it idea… but what exactly am I meant to do if I get there and this thing is already chewing on her bones?"

"Well, in that case, I would say you have two options," the sentence became more laced with sarcasm as he continued. "You either run, or if you prefer maybe you can die just a little sooner than the rest of us."

"There’s no need to snap. I just wanted to know if you had actually made any plans for that eventuality.

I shall go now and steal Xander’s car keys and drive illegally to my inevitable doom."

"When Xander sobers up tell him I said I love him too." With that somewhat melodramatic exit the line went dead.

"You know, Bunny, I’m sure my husband will be able to tell you where we put all that stuff of Willow’s when we converted her room into a study, but it’s so nice to see you again. Willow said that you’d got engaged last time she called. I assume this must be Mike.

How is your mother? We never did get around to doing lunch after that whole thing at the town hall. You know, I really meant to call her but everything was just so hectic, and with Willow dating that rock musician we were so worried about her." She cast a worried glance at Spike’s coif as if she were suddenly wondering whether such a style was possible for someone who wasn’t in a band. "Why don’t I get you both a soda? I’m sure Ira will be home in a couple of minutes and he’d be so disappointed to miss you."

"Really, I think we should be going. Maybe we can find a pet store that’s open at one of the out of town malls or something. It’s just when the heater blew, Willow said that all the bits for her fish tank were packed away over here and that it would tide us over till we could get to the store." Buffy raced through her cover story again. "’Cause the fish might get cold… at night… because it’s colder then than during the day."

Buffy had never been so pleased at the prospect of facing a hostile demon, as she was when her phone rang and Wesley told her where to find the redhead.

"We, em, have to go. That was my little sister, well, her date actually," she amended when Spike’s raised eyebrow intimated that the timbre of Wes’s voice had probably been heard by Willow’s mother. "They’ve, um, broken down and we need to go pick them up. So we have to go… now."

"Okay, dear. Well, if Ira knows where that heater is should we drop it across for you?"

Buffy tried to think of a good excuse for the house being empty and failed. "Why don’t you do that?" she replied with a false smile instead.

As they opened up the DeSoto again, Spike passed Buffy ten bucks. "You’re right," he told her. "I didn’t think anybody could suck that bad at the undercover stuff."

Willow began to chant. The language was demonic and if she had but known her accent was abysmal. Unfortunately, to the demon she was trying to summon the words were more than clear enough. Just when a demon finally got some time for herself, there was some no-account mortal trying to interrupt her night off. She only just had time to rinse off her face pack before she could feel the magic pulling her to another dimension. Whoever was doing this was going to be very sorry indeed, unless of course they had an extremely nice present, and even then she wasn’t so sure.

Thank goodness these mortals didn’t know the difference between a dressing gown and a ball gown. At least she wasn’t wearing pyjamas.

Murphy’s Law said that Tara had to be on the absolute opposite side of the campus when she got Anya’s message. She forgot all the things she’d ever learned about how to conduct herself when she had to travel alone at night, warnings about appearing unusually hurried or flustered. Instead, she ran until she was gasping for air and then she ran some more. She ran until her throat and lungs burned and she had to stop, doubled over with her hands on her knees, but her objective was just within sight in the distance. That was when the vampire stepped out of the bushes beside the path to confront her.

"Hey, little girl, did you know that I could hear your blood pumping when you were still twenty yards away? I can smell your fear and it smells good."

The vampire’s gaze was fixed on the luscious curves of Tara’s breasts as they heaved with every hyperventilating breath that the witch took, her normally modest clothing affording the demon an excellent view given her current pose. Every ounce of physical effort she could muster was focused on simply regulating her breathing once more, so that she could speak.

The demon seemed to be aware of this, and even paused in his approach, toying with her as she was obviously in no condition to get away from him.

"I-it’s n-not you I’m scared of." Tara stumbled over her words but not out of nervousness, simply because she was still so short of breath.

"You should be. I’m going to kill you… but I might just play with you a little, first."

"I don’t think so," the witch replied as she levitated her stake through his heart. Physically, she might need some recovery time. Magically, she hadn’t even started.

Anya fumbled through Xander’s trouser pockets, getting a gentle swat from his sleeping hand for her efforts, but unfortunately no car keys.

"Xander, honey. Where did you put the car keys?" Anya tried to shake him awake as gently as possible and when that didn’t work she became progressively louder and the shaking became progressively more violent.

Finally, Xander jerked awake as his brain told him that his wife had just bellowed that his best friend was about to cause an apocalypse and she needed the car keys because Giles wanted her to be the first to die when she didn’t manage to talk her round.

Anya pulled open the drawer and pulled out the keys with an air of triumph. "Don’t be silly, Xander. Why would Giles want me dead? I’m his star employee. You must be dreaming. Why don’t you dream the one about the Princess Leia outfit again? You know the one where I’m dancing and I have a chain around my neck and you keep pulling me closer and closer."

"Mmmm, good idea," Xander replied, already half asleep again as he nuzzled his face into his pillows.

Anya sneaked from the room as quietly as she could without slowing down too much. At least, if things were as bad as they thought they might be, Xander would be safe a little while longer in his makeshift bed.

Anya easily found her way to where she wanted to go. She pulled up the mauve sedan before the rather forbidding-looking building with a slight screech. She hadn’t quite got the hang of smooth deceleration yet. Nevertheless, considering she’d never actually taken the class she was doing a lot better than Buffy.

It would have been too much to expect for the front door to be open and after trying it and finding it locked, Anya began to work her way around the building, hoping to find the same way in as Willow.

Wes pulled the bike over next to the front entrance of one of the university buildings. He checked the building’s name and then held his hand out towards Giles.

"Giles." The other watcher pointed at the intersection fifty or sixty yards ahead. "We’ve arrived at that junction three times from three different directions now, one of which involved driving the wrong way down a one-way street, so perhaps if you would be so kind as to pass the map we won’t end up visiting it for a fourth time."

"I should have known she wouldn’t have been at her mother’s. Now we’re going to be too late. What if she’s already summoned it?" Buffy asked the vampire as they headed toward campus.

"Then, we’ll do what we always do. I’ll stand back and cheer you on while you kick its butt."

Buffy couldn’t help but smile. "And if it whoops…" Buffy made a swirling gesture in the air with one finger. "Time back on us, then what do we do?"

"And there’s no way to write ourselves a note or anything to say what’s happened."

"Nope, ‘cause if they turn the clock back we won’t have been here to do it."

"Spike, what if it sends us all back years instead of days? What if we end up fighting again? What if I lose you?"

"Not gonna happen, princess. Didn’t I tell you it was fate? Things between us would work out just the same in the end no matter how often we had to do things. We’re meant to be."

"Okay, like Bogart and Bacall?" Buffy suggested, remembering the pictures on the bedroom wall of Spike’s apartment.

"She’s meant to be, too, love." Despite the vampire’s reassuring words and calm demeanour Buffy could feel his own anxiety rise. There were times when she wished the bond didn’t tell her quite so much about his feelings.

"Evania, demon lord of time and illusions, I call you here and hold you by my will and the circle that surrounds you seven times over. Meet my bargain and you may leave." Willow intoned the last words of the actual spell in the demon tongue, but she knew that was more or less what they meant.

Aside from her slightly bluish skin tone and seemingly natural whiter-than-Spike hair, the demon could have stepped from the cover of a forties film magazine. Her ankle-length dressing gown was made from a material that had the sheen of midnight silk and clung like cotton jersey. It buttoned with delicate pearlescent fastenings from her ample cleavage to mid-thigh, exposing a well-turned leg, set off by a pair of high-heeled mules. Willow found her heart beating faster and it wasn’t entirely because of the power and hostility that rolled from the creature in waves.

The demon simply crossed her arms, drawing even more attention to her well-proportioned chest and raised a delicately arched eyebrow as if to say, name your terms but don’t expect me to like them.

Willow was slightly thrown by the stony silence from the demon and wasn’t entirely sure if the creature even understood English.

"I wish for you to take back time, for two rotations of this world upon its axis. In return, I offer the sacrifice of precious stone and innocent blood." Without moving from where she sat, Willow used her mind to peel back the tape that bound the box’s occupant inside. As soon as she did a dark grey head peered over the rim of the box. Its bone structure and the shape of its ears suggested a parentage that was part labrador and part great dane, but the colour and wiry texture of its coat suggested there was a bit of wolfhound in there as well.

The wicca then began to levitate the trembling puppy toward the circle; its oversized and probably clumsy feet paddling at thin air as if it were trying to swim.

The demon gave a dismissive snort. "For one thing you’d be lucky if quartz even counts as semi-precious, though it might make a pretty paperweight. And for another, don’t they teach you people to read these days?

Sac-ri-fice… Look it up. It means something you will actually miss, not some mongrel stray that was probably slated to be put to sleep anyway."

"Yeah, and it was probably written in an age when most people measured their worth in pigs and cows and chickens. Inflation, honey. Ever heard of it?" For several minutes the demon seemed to look into Willow’s eyes as if she could see straight into her mind.

"The lover would be a fitting sacrifice, but she’s not yours to bequeath. What say you run fetch that laptop you’re so fond of?"

"What about it? I don’t want it…" Just as the demon was refuting any claim to the animal, not unnaturally for a young animal being levitated in mid-air, the beast chose to display its nervousness in a tangible manner.

The demon stepped back as far as the circle would let her to avoid the golden spray that splattered over the boards of the clock tower and over Willow’s carefully drawn sand circle. Then, as the stream washed through the lines, creating gaps in the design, she backed away even further, stepping out of the circle altogether.

Willow was too busy scrambling to her feet to avoid the flow herself to notice at first, but when the demon stepped free from both the circle and her will, the wiccan staggered to a nearby wall. She needed its support to stay upright. The dog landed sharply on its feet and scampered for the nearest exit, the stairway down.

"You think you have the power to bind me, little girl. You want me to tinker with time to do your bidding. I’ll tinker, then, but you won’t like the result."

The demon extended a delicately manicured hand, index finger outstretched toward the redhead and began a guttural chant in the same language the witch had used to summon her.

The redhead smiled a smug grin. Whatever the demon was doing obviously wasn’t working. No lightning bolts, no balls of fire. This demon wasn’t so tough.

"Is that all you’ve got? I don’t think you’re trying," she taunted, knowing if not for her fatigue she could put up a far showier display. Then, she realised that her view of the demon seemed to be getting slightly out of focus. She looked down at her hand and didn’t recognise it. The skin seemed drier, the fingers pudgier. Her clothes started to cut in under the arms and at the crotch as if they were a couple of sizes too small. She tugged at her hair, pulling a small section down taut in front of her face, squinting at it until she confirmed the presence of white strands between the now dull and lifeless reddish brown.

"Yes, you stupid mortal, I can. If I wanted I could take you through to your deathbed or maybe just to the borders of senility where you’re just aware enough of the fact that your mind is going for it to upset you in your lucid moments. Then again, your body could give out first so that you’re all too aware of the indignity of having to be escorted to the bathroom by your mother… Or do you think they’d put you in a nursing home and forget you?"

The demon could have kept up her end of the conversation a bit longer, but Willow had slumped into unconsciousness, and she really didn’t see the point.

"Thank whoever!" the ex-demon said when she saw the witch. "I think she went in this way, but it’s bolted from the inside."

Tara held her right hand up, palm toward the door as if she could use it to "see" through the wood. She ran it up and down near the door’s outer edge a couple of times, and then moved it to the left. As she did so, both girls could hear the sound of metal against metal. She raised her hand to release a second bolt when there was a frantic clawing sound from the other side of the door. Tara gave Anya a puzzled look and since there was nothing in the back alley where they were that they could use as a weapon, Tara pulled her stake from her bag, passing it to the other girl.

She pushed the door open, working at first against the weight of the puppy that was behind it until the dog saw its chance for freedom and tried to wriggle through the gap as it opened.

Once they saw the nature of their assailant, Tara forced it back into the room as she squeezed through the partially open door, and then prevented it escaping by virtue of a firm grip around its chest while Anya made her way in.

"Not necessarily," the former demon replied as the pair headed for the stairs. "I eviscerated quite a few people that summoned me before they got as far as doing anything like that, but then any man that summoned me was asking for trouble. I’m still not quite sure why I left Giles alive, you know, but I suppose it was for the best."

When they heard Willow’s cry, they broke into a run, grabbing at the staircase’s supports so that their momentum would swing them around corners and taking the stairs two at a time.

Tara almost ran into Anya’s back as the other girl stopped dead in shock at the scene before her eyes.

"Evie? What in Arashmahar are you doing here? And why on earth are you only wearing your dressing gown?" she asked.

Chapter 1.10

"Anyanka? You’re all mortal. What happened to you?"

Anya sighed. "Long story… We could go for a drink? Maybe a frappuccino?"

"Frappuccino?"

"Cold frothy coffee. It’s nicer than it sounds."

The demon looked unconvinced. "It’s ideas like that that remind me why I haven’t visited this dimension since you started the War of the Roses."

Anya gave a wistful sigh. "Honestly, you would like it if you tried it. And what about you? You were working as a mischief demon last time I saw you."

"It’s been three hundred years and change, Annie. A girl picks up a new skill every once in a while. Then, a community here and there actually starts worshipping you and whoo, power here I come. You know how it is…"

Tara cleared her throat slightly. "Em, Anya, is your friend going to object if I check on Willow?"

The demon turned to Tara and gave her what she probably considered was a winning smile. "No need, dear. She’s just fine other than being unconscious. Of course, she is a little bit older than she used to be. Unfortunately, I can’t guarantee that she’ll end up any wiser, but we can hope."

Turning back to Anya she continued. "Can you believe she tried to offer me some mongrel mutt to take back time? Don’t these people have any standards? And then she levitated the poor beast and was surprised when it peed all over her precious circle. Some people just shouldn’t be allowed near a spell book."

"She certainly shouldn’t. If she wasn’t my husband’s best friend since kindergarten, I’d probably have nothing to do with her."

"You got married? That’s not very appropriate for the patron saint of scorned women."

"Times change. I have an idea…" Anya linked her arm through the demon’s. "I’ve got a car outside. We can go back to my place, and prod him awake so you can meet him. Then we can order pizza, drink what’s left of his booze and watch his porn while we catch up."

She turned to Tara. "Buffy and the others will be here soon. They can help you with Willow and the pooch. You can tell them they don’t need to worry about Evie any more."

They got about half way down the first flight of stairs when there was a resounding crash from beneath them.

* * * * *

Wesley had just worked out where they were on the map and was about to work out the best route to where he wanted to be when a distinctive, black, finned car drove past them. He thrust the map back at Giles and pulled out, determined not to lose sight of the DeSoto. Buffy had lived on campus. She had to know where she was going.

When the DeSoto pulled up next to Xander’s Ford, Wes was still right behind them. Wes and Giles just managed to get their helmets off before Buffy used her previously untested orb-given strength to kick open the front doors of the clock tower as if they were the door to Spike’s old crypt. She stood for a second, framed by the doorway, listening to hear what was going on. Then a dark grey streak pelted past her at such a speed that if she hadn’t had the orbs she would probably have been knocked off balance.

Spike simply turned to watch the dog go, but both watchers tried to catch it, much to his amusement as the dog dodged them both with ease. His amusement wasn’t to last long, however.

"Oh, crap!" Buffy turned to him. "You can track it later, can’t you? Once we deal with… Anya’s new friend?" The slayer and the others stared incredulously as Anya made her way downstairs arm in arm with a rather attractive demon.

"Anya, pet, I don’t believe you’ve introduced us to this stunning lady." The vampire smiled and sauntered over to where the two women now waited at the bottom of the staircase. The demon adjusted her slightly longer than shoulder length hair, brushing it away from her face at one side.

Anya rolled her eyes. "Evie, this is Spike, a.k.a. William the Bloody, and the possessive-looking, little blonde next to him is his fiancée and mate, Buffy Summers the Vampire Slayer." Anya stressed Spike’s relationship with Buffy as if to remind the vampire, who was displaying all the gallantry of his upbringing and none of the awkwardness. "The other two are Giles and Wesley. They used to be her watchers before she outgrew them."

"Charmed, I’m sure," Spike replied. "Everythin’ with Red all sorted out, then?"

"Tara was keeping an eye on her until you all got here. So, since you’re here now… we’ll leave."

The men in the group all stepped back to allow the two women through before they and Buffy began to make their way up the staircase to see what awaited them.

As Anya started up the car, Evania cast a glance back toward the double doors. "You know, it must be nearly thirteen hundred years since the last time there was a slayer mated to a vampire," she said.

Anya shrugged. "Spike’ll be so upset when he finds out. He always wants to be unique. So what happened to them? The other two…"

This time it was the demon who shrugged.

"No one knows. One day, there was a new slayer and no one saw them again. There were plenty of theories. Some people said they were killed "on the job". Well, her job, anyway. Some say he turned her so that they could be alone together and they’re still living the dream. Some say it was some sort of suicide pact but my personal favourite was the one where the Council of Watchers killed them both."

The demon turned to Anya with a raised eyebrow, "Strange that your slayer’s got not one, but two, watchers in tow when you say neither of them are really her watcher any more."

* * * * *

As Buffy and Spike made their way upstairs hand in hand, followed by the two watchers, Buffy resumed her interrupted conversation.

"You can find the dog, can’t you? Sniff it out or something?"

Spike rolled his eyes. "I could. What makes you think I will? Do I look like I work for Animal Control?"

Buffy let her lower lip form into a pout, her eyes wide and innocent. "But Dawn’s always wanted a dog… That story about the Saint Bernard? She meant it… And it was pretty big for a puppy. I bet it could grow into a decent-sized guard dog. Help keep Dawn safe when we’re out on patrol."

"Bloody hell! Leave off with the emotional blackmail, love. You do realise with our luck that the damn thing’s more likely to chew all the furniture, pee on Joyce’s rugs and we already know it’ll run like the blazes at the first sign of trouble."

"But Dawn’ll love it, anyway."

"Yeah," Spike’s tone softened. "She probably will, but first we’ve got to have things out with Red."

Buffy gave a nervous swallow. "I guess we do."

* * * * *

Without a word Buffy made her way to where Tara was kneeling beside Willow’s horizontal form. As she made her way to sit opposite the blonde, fussing over the witch’s unconscious form, Spike released her hand to place an arm around Tara’s shoulders as he dropped to his knees next to her. Giles joined the group and began a check on Willow’s vital signs whilst Wes hung back just slightly.

"So, how’re you doin’, pet?"

Tara turned her head to look at him through a veil of tawny-blonde hair. "Don’t you mean how’s she doing?"

"Nope. Can see and hear as much as you’re like to be able to tell me about Red an’ seein’ as she’s out for the count, I reckon as I might as well see how my favourite non-Summers Scooby’s takin’ this whole situation."

Tara seemed almost flummoxed by the question. "I-Uh-I, well, I-." Her eyes pooled with tears. Spike’s arm pulled her closer as they both twisted their upper bodies until they faced each other. His hands stroked her hair as she tried again to frame an answer to his question. "You-. Sorry for the weepy, it’s just people don’t normally ask about me."

"Then people are idiots!" Spike’s impatience about Tara’s past treatment was evident before his voice softened again. "Besides, you were the first person to stick me with the Scooby label, weren’t you? That means you were like the first one to adopt me into the "family", so to speak, so it’s your own fault if you get Big Brother Spike instead of the Big Bad. You tell us what we can do to help you through this, and then you consider it done. Okay?"

Tears flowed freely down Tara’s face now. "It’s okay. I mean, I wouldn’t say no if you offered me a lift back to the dorm with my stuff, but I don’t really think I can be around Willow, so it’s awkward… I’ll be okay." When she saw Spike’s sceptical look she continued. "I will… in time. I was doing okay before. I guess it just wasn’t meant to work."

"I guess not, pet. Sometimes, though, these things? They turn out for the best. I thought my world had ended when Dru left me but it ended up bein’ a new beginning.

An’…" Spike listened closely to Willow’s breathing and heartbeat for a few seconds to confirm that she was still sound asleep. "That dorm idea, if that’s really what you want, then you’ve got it, no questions asked. Thing is, Buffy and me were talking about this in the car, an’ well, when it comes to Dawn, we’re not prepared to give Red any more chances." Tara’s eyes flicked to Buffy, the slayer’s tiny nod confirming that Spike spoke for them both. "Bit’s already feelin’ vulnerable an’ I reckon when what happened tonight sinks in, it’s goin’ to make things worse. The bottom line is that Red’s dangerous and it’s our job to keep Niblet safe. We’re going to have to ask her to move out. She hasn’t left us any other option.

So, if you can put up with the rest of us fussin’ around you an’ hoggin’ the bathroom, not to mention Bitty’s new puppy that to judge by round here, doesn’t appear to be housetrained and it’s really just because you can’t be ‘round Red, we’d both be happy if you’d consider staying. I know the Niblet would be right gutted if you disappeared again, especially with things the way they are.

Okay?

Chances are Niblet’s gonna want company tonight, so you could always have Buffy’s bed for the night and think it over. I mean, if Red doesn’t come round soon and whatever so we can’t get it sorted out tonight." Having done so well for most of his little speech Spike suddenly found himself babbling.

"Hell! I’m makin’ a right arse of this. What-.

We, all three of us, like havin’ you around, and we’d miss you if you left and we’d worry about you bein’ on your own, an’ that’s about the size of it."

Spike pulled her close again, letting her bury her head on his shoulder as she cried tears that stemmed as much from relief that she wouldn’t have to face emotional exile again as from her shattered heart.

* * * * *

Buffy watched as her friend cried herself out on her fiancé’s shoulder, marvelling at how easily he had extended the nurturing side of his nature to include the other girl simply because she had demonstrated her acceptance of him. They waited for some time to see if Willow would come round before Buffy finally spoke up.

"Spike? We’re going to have to make a move if we want to have a chance to catch that puppy and still pick up Dawn at ten."

Spike nodded and looked over to Wesley. "Think you can drop off Glinda and we’ll take Red and Rupes in the car?" Spike acted almost without thinking to spare Tara from having to cradle her unconscious soon-to-be-ex-girlfriend in her lap on the drive home. Then, he passed his car keys to Buffy before scooping up Willow’s form into his arms.

Wes somewhat self-consciously placed an arm around Tara’s shoulders as he escorted her downstairs. His concerns about his own romantic life seemed terribly petty under the present circumstances.

Ten minutes later, Willow was ensconced, still unconscious, in the bed that had once belonged to Buffy’s mother. Joyce had always been fastidious about her hair colour and her moisturising regime so that she had always looked younger than her true age. If she had still been alive it seemed likely that anyone comparing her with Willow would have mistaken her for marginally the younger of the two.

Tara retreated to Buffy’s room while Wesley was left to ring Dawn to explain that Spike and Buffy would be along shortly to pick her up, but they had an errand to attend to first so she shouldn’t worry if they were a little late. He was going to avail himself of another beer and see if Giles cared to join him again in the still of the garden, but the limit of the older man’s diplomacy had been reached and he had slipped upstairs to interrogate Tara.

He knocked gently on Buffy’s room door.

"Tara?" he paused trying to pick up some clue as to the well-being or otherwise of the room’s occupant from the sounds from the room. "Tara, I was wondering if you might be able to provide any illumination as to what’s actually wrong with Willow?"

Slowly, the door to the room was pulled open and Giles followed Tara into the room when she moved to sit on Buffy’s bed, her eyes fixed on the carpet.

"Do you know what happened to her?"

"I think Evie cast a spell of some sort on her, but it was really all over before Anya and I got there. She said there was nothing wrong with her other than being unconscious and a bit older, though she couldn’t guarantee she’d be any wiser."

"Anya’s friend stole her youth?"

Tara shrugged dejectedly. "That makes it sound like Evie had something to gain from it. I don’t think she did. I don’t know why, but I think it was more like it was her way to try to teach Willow to have the proper respect for the power she uses."

Giles gave Tara a contemplative glance. "This demon has almost certainly shortened Willow’s life-span by more than twenty years, yet you seem to be relatively unconcerned."

"I just see it differently. I think she spared Willow’s life when she could easily have taken it. She tried to teach her a valuable lesson and if it has worked then maybe Willow will actually make it through the next year without getting herself killed in some equally stupid stunt, but if I’m honest I doubt even this will be enough. Chances are Willow’s first reaction will be to try to magic things better.

You can’t tell me that you approve of what she did, can you?"

"No, of course not, but I do feel that we’re obligated to at least explore all the options. There may be some less drastic alternative that could be considered."

Tara sighed. "I disagree but if you mean it, I suggest you talk to Evie before she leaves. She should be over at Anya’s."

Tara lifted her head to look Giles in the eye for the first time since the start of the conversation. "Willow knows way too much about the theory of magic, but she understands nothing about the spirit of magic. Spike was right. She’s dangerous. I’ve tried and tried to get her to understand till I’m just too tired to keep trying. Maybe Evie’s way will work, maybe not, but if Willow gets out of this with no more serious consequences than baking cookies then just think what she might try next time.

I really think, for her own good, that you should leave things as they are, Giles."

"I see," Giles removed his glasses but instead of cleaning them he let them dangle between his fingers and pinched the bridge of his nose between the thumb and first finger of his free hand. "You really think such a step is necessary?"

"I really do."

Still not entirely convinced, Giles turned toward the door, wondering if he rang up Spike on his mobile to ask where he’d stashed his supply of bourbon in the house, whether the vampire would actually tell him. He needed something stronger than beer. He felt like he had been complicit in starting Willow along the path that had led to this. Right now, that thought bothered him more than a little. He had a feeling it was going to be on his conscience for a very long time. Later, he might try to ring the coven to see if they had any suggestions. How do you help someone if they won’t or can’t accept that they have a problem? For now, he had to come to terms with his part in Willow’s transformation from shy, awkward schoolgirl to the magical equivalent of an idiot savant.

"Xander, honey," Anya called, as she pushed open the apartment door. "I’ve brought a friend to meet you."

She turned to whisper to Evie. "He seemed kind of down when I got in. He doesn’t normally drink, but I didn’t quite get time to work out what was wrong, what with having to go look for Willow and everything. And the extra weight’s kind of a recent thing…"

Evie gave a grin. "It could be arranged. I could give you a preview if you wanted?" Her eyes travelled to the still unconscious form of the brunette in the middle of the floor.

Anya tilted her head to one side and considered. "Nah, I wouldn’t want to spoil the surprise. I’ll take my chances."

The former vengeance demon leant over her husband’s slumbering form and blew into his ear. Xander’s hand came up and brushed at the area like a dog scratching at fleas. Anya leant over and shook his shoulder before kissing his cheek.

"Xander? Wake up, cookie-face. There’s someone here to see you, well to see me really, but you can’t just lie in the middle of the floor."

"Well, you wouldn’t, hon, not after half a bottle of bourbon. I’ll get you some water but you’ve got to sit up. We’ve got company. Once you meet Evie if you still don’t feel so good you can go to bed."

Evie cleared her throat. "Annie, are you sure you don’t want me to do my little post-party trick?"

Anya looked from the demon to her husband. "It might be an idea. Xander, you know how you feel real bad. Would you rather feel like this for hours or would you rather feel like you’re really going to die for about five minutes and then be better?"

Anya rolled her eyes and started again. "Evie, my friend, can make you feel better quicker… but, she can’t make you suffer any less. So basically all the after effects you’d get over the next day or so, they’d be… condensed. You see?"

"Hey, sitting right here. Well, lying right here, actually. Ahn, honey, why does your friend look like an extra from Babylon 5?"

Anya arched an eyebrow. "Xander, you spend your whole life on the Hellmouth and you still believed that all those extras were people in make up?"

Comprehension finally dawned and Xander jumped away from the Evie as if she was about to bite him. "D-demon!" Then, he noticed Anya’s less than amused expression and forced himself to smile at their guest. "Of course, obviously a friendly demon, who is your friend and not going to kill us."

Evie grinned. "How big an us are you talking about? I mean, you and Annie are pretty safe, but your little witch friend could be dying right now."

"Evie!" Anya reprimanded. "Don’t tease. Xander’s not very good at reading demon folk. He’ll think you mean it.

I know it’s theoretically possible but Willow would have to be really stupid-."

"And what she did tonight wasn’t? Bet she puts another ten or fifteen years on the clock before she stops trying to magic it away."

Anya gave an irritated toss of her head. "Like I’m just going to throw away money…"

Xander sobered up in an instant, though that didn’t prevent his brain from feeling like it was being crushed in a vice every time he moved his head to look from one woman to the other.

"Relax," Evie replied. "She’s totally uninjured, and if she gets her life in order the effects are entirely reversible. If on the other hand she continues to misuse her power, she’ll age herself into an early grave."

"I mean that your friend is lucky I’m the one she chose to summon up. Most people who could do what she wanted would rip her apart for having the nerve to do such an insulting summoning."

Xander levered himself into a standing position, only to discover that he didn’t tower over Evie as he’d expected. Instead, he still had to tilt his head back to look her in the eye.

He couldn’t help but think how much her eyes reminded him of Meg Foster’s even as he demanded a clearer response, enunciating each word with as much menace as he could give it when part of his brain was telling him how close he was to a truly remarkable cleavage.

"I taught her a lesson. I linked her ageing to her moral decay. As she becomes more corrupt she’ll become physically older."

Both women snorted their disbelief. "I told you before that when the quiet ones get a whiff of power they just run wild. All Evie’s done is put the brakes on."

"I can’t believe you." Xander turned on his wife. "You know what Willow means to me and you bring home someone who’s done some sort of spell on her and expect me to make friends with her."

"Technically, it’s a curse. And you expect me to be friends with Willow even after she manipulated Tara’s memories so that Tara would stay with her and have sex with her. At least there’s a reason other than pure selfishness behind what Evie did."

"Actually," Evie admitted, "I was mostly just pissed at the whole ruining my night off and thinking I’d want some stupid puppy. I guess I just spent too long as a mischief demon to go straight for the kill."

"Willow was going to give you a puppy?" the carpenter asked, confused once more.

Evie caught Xander’s gaze and held it. "You want to see what your Willow would do? Let me show you what your Willow would do…"

Xander’s eyes glazed over as Evie chanted once more in the demon tongue that she had used earlier. Anya watched as her husband’s expression turned to one of horror before Evie passed the palm of her hand in front of his eyes and he blinked several times before shaking his head as if to clear it.

Evie shrugged. "An illusion, yes, but an illusion based on what would have happened if things had gone to plan for your little witch tonight. And what could have happened after that.

Annie, I think I’m going to cut this visit short. You know how to get a message to me. If you want to arrange something for another time maybe the two of us can do something." The demon stepped forward and Xander noticed as she took hold of Anya by the shoulders that despite his perception earlier she wasn’t more than a couple of inches taller than his wife. She placed a gentle kiss on each of Anya’s cheeks before she disappeared, leaving Anya to glower at her husband.

"I’m going to go see what your friend did to Willow," Xander announced, pulling open the dresser drawer to look for his car keys.

"Fine," answered Anya. "Go see your little witch, but you won’t get far without these." She pulled her hand from a pocket, letting his keys dangle from her fingertips. She walked into the bathroom, slammed the door behind her and locked herself in.

Xander didn’t have a clue what he should do when the sound of sobbing reached him from the other side of the door.

"What should we call it?" Buffy asked sort of skipping backwards so that she could face Spike as she walked.

Spike gave a snort of amusement. "Well, I reckon given our luck the ‘mad, bad and dangerous to know’ quote would probably be appropriate but that was Lord Byron, and your little stray just happens to be female."

"Oh." Buffy sounded disappointed but this quickly passed. "Ew! Gross, Spike. Sniffing doggy sexy smells."

"You know, seeing as you forced me into tracking her, it’s not like I could just not pay any attention."

"Trail’s still fairly old, but a dog that age, it’s probably scarpered like the blazes and then curled up for a kip because it’s knacked itself."

Spike grabbed at Buffy’s arm just in time to stop her tripping over an exposed tree root. "Watch you don’t drop that bloody tub." The vampire indicated a large Tupperware dish that the slayer was carrying. "Bad enough cookin’ for two hours to give the stuff to a dog without droppin’ it before we even find the mutt." He took the container from her hands and placed it on the ground before pulling her close.

As Spike’s lips neared her own Buffy teased the vampire. "It’s just some stinky old beef casserole."

Spike nibbled gently at Buffy’s lower lip before responding. "That is not some stinky old beef casserole. That is prime steak cooked in brown ale, and if we hadn’t had to race off before I got time to add the finishing touches it would have been Flemish carbonnade of beef."

"Phlegm-y, carbonised beef? How appetising." Spike was captivated by the laughter in her eyes. His hands came up to cradle her face as he made to kiss her again and his love for her arced through her whole body like a massive power surge. She felt revitalised, as if with this man beside her she could do anything.

Buffy opened her mouth in a low moan as the sensation flowed through her and Spike’s mouth covered hers in a passionate but tender kiss. Buffy was unable to prevent the swell of her own feelings of love and desire from engulfing both of them, nor did she want to do so.

When he finally drew his head back, Spike scooped his woman into his arms and spun her round until her laughter reached the sky.

"You are insane," Buffy told him as he finally slowed to a halt, letting Buffy slide down his body as he returned her to her feet.

"Uh-huh," conceded the vampire, "but only when it comes to you." Buffy made no attempt to move away from the circle of his arms. In fact she pressed against him until something hard ground into her hips.

Her tongue flicked out to moisten her lips before she asked in an arch voice, "Is that half a set of manacles in your pocket or are you just happy to see me?"

"Both," Spike answered in a huskier voice than his normal. "Now, unless you want me to drag you into those bushes over there, we’d better go find that mutt."

"Well, not that I would mind… but Dawn is waiting. And who knows what could happen to a poor defenceless puppy on the streets of night-time Sunnydale?"

He scooped the container up from its place on the ground and passed it to her. "Let’s make this quick, then. You never know. We might squeeze a minute or two for ourselves once we round up all the waifs and strays."

"Yeah, like anything we can do in less than a couple of hours doesn’t leave us both just wanting more?" All the same her free arm slipped around Spike’s waist under his coat, her thumb hooking onto his belt loop so that it was anchored firmly, and Spike wrapped an arm around her shoulders to hold her near as they set off once more at a slightly brisker pace.

They were almost back at Stevenson Hall when Spike announced that the dog was nearby, hiding in the bushes.

"Probably. Won’t hurt to try, and I’d rather not crawl round on my hands and knees trying to drag the thing out."

Buffy opened up the Tupperware dish and set it on the ground a few feet from the bushes. Soon a snuffling could be heard nearby and then a canine nose appeared from under one of the nearby shrubs. The nose was followed by a head and shoulders and the dog regarded the pair suspiciously, though it was patently interested in the tub of food.

Buffy picked up the container and began to move very slowly toward the wary pooch, holding out her hand so that she could get her scent. Spike held back, knowing that some dogs were spooked by the scent of vampires.

He waited until the dog was completely out from under the bush and wolfing down what had been intended as dinner for five before he slipped the chain he carried from his pocket. At one end of the chain was a wrist cuff and at the other was a large metal ring that had once been used to fix the bindings to a wall or floor. Buffy had pulled apart the first link of the other chain that had until recently graced the hoop, thanks to the orbs. Now Spike let a loop of chain drop through the ring to form a crude, bulky, but hopefully effective improvised choke chain. He passed it to Buffy who managed to slip the noose over the dog’s head whilst she was busy trying to lick the last of the gravy from the dish.

The dog looked up, obviously hoping for more, but when Buffy simply took the time to rub behind her ears and pet her she seemed content to stay there, trying to lick any bare flesh of Buffy’s that came within reach of her mouth. Spike moved forward, holding out his hand to the beast, who sniffed it curiously before deciding that it, too, needed a coating of dog spit.

The vampire grimaced and rubbed his hand on the dog’s coat to dry it off a bit.

"See?" Buffy asked triumphantly. "She might only be an adopted Summers woman but she was bound to like you."

Their new four-legged friend trotted after them quite happily until they got within a block of the clock tower at which point she sat down, began to tremble as if the temperature was sub-zero and refused, even when the chain pulled tight around her neck, to move another inch. Finally, Spike had to pick her up and carry her to the car, with her struggling all the way to get out of his arms.

"Whatever Red was up to before we got there, she certainly had the poor bugger spooked as hell. Don’t know what the mutt’s going to make of being in the same house as her."

"We’ll just have to see." Buffy shrugged. "I guess if it’s too bad we’ll have to move her to Giles’ hotel or something."

"Are we talking about Red or the dog, pet?" Spike asked as he pushed the dog into the back seat of the DeSoto and slammed the door shut before she could make a dash for it.

"What kept you guys?" Dawn was sitting with Brandon on a swing that hung from the front porch of his house, her bag at her feet. "You’re twenty minutes late."

"We had to find something," Buffy answered. "Check out the back seat of the car." A wet nose was pressed against the newly-cleaned glass.

"Actually, I was thinking that you might want her. Of course, you would have to walk her before it got dark and clean up any mess she makes and stuff like that. Otherwise, I guess we’ll have to take her to the pound tomorrow."

"So they do." Buffy’s face cracked into a grin. "I guess that means you want to keep her, huh?"

A suspicious look crossed Dawn’s face, and she looked from one of the pair to the other. "What brought this on?"

"We’ll tell you when we get home. For now, why don’t you say goodbye to Brandon? We’ll wait in the car."

She pulled an obviously reluctant Spike away from the younger couple. As they got back in the car the vampire mused, "I wonder how you’d go about training the mutt to growl at him every time he kisses her?"

Buffy rolled her eyes. "Why bother training the dog to do it when we’ve got you?"

"You wouldn't happen to know where Spike keeps his stash of hard liquor, would you?"

"Back at his apartment, I believe. I don't think he trusts Dawn enough to leave that sort of stuff lying around the house. Probably with good reason."

Wes shrugged. "Beer, an odd bottle of wine with dinner. Can't say that I've seen him with anything stronger and considering the look on his face when Dawn turned up on her boyfriend's motorbike, if there had been something stronger in the house, then he would have been drinking it."

"Good lord!" Giles didn't know which part of that last sentence shocked him more. Spike had obviously cut down on his drinking, Dawn was dating, Dawn was dating a biker and Spike was back in his protector role, apparently with Buffy's consent.

"You know, I've no idea. I did get the impression that dinner the other night was his first visit."

Wes gave a wry smile. "I think getting a mortal wound trying to defend Dawn bought him a certain amount of leeway."

"What on earth has been going on around here?" Giles asked, suddenly realising that perhaps he had left this afternoon before Anya had reached the more important pieces of exposition.

Willow came to gradually, the sound of muffled voices drawing her from her sleep. She struggled at first to remember why she should be asleep at such a time. Then her recollection returned. She opened up her laptop and checked the date on its clock. Still Thursday, May 16th, 2002. It seemed to taunt her. All she had wanted was a couple of days.

She moved to the mirror, seeing a face she didn't recognise. She sat for some time looking at the new lines and wrinkles that marred her skin. That demon had a nerve doing something like this to her. Next time she summoned her she would make sure she was better prepared. Then, they would see who came off best. She would show her no one bullies Willow Rosenberg any more, mentally, magically or physically. First though, she had to recover her energy so that she could fix this.

She wondered who had brought her home. The voices coming from the garden drew her to her window, but she could only see the two former watchers. There was no sign of any of the house's actual residents. Had they been the ones to find her? Maybe it wasn't too late for a forgetting spell or two. She couldn't believe that Giles would actually understand what she had attempted. He kept trying to put boundaries around her, but the Goddess would never have gifted her with such power if she were meant to keep within the confines that were set to protect lesser practitioners. Giles would pretend he didn't understand that, though. It was jealousy, pure and simple. Not only had Buffy outgrown her need of him, but little Willow had so far surpassed him in the magical arts that it was him rather than her who was shown up as the rank amateur. Still, he insisted on trying to act the father figure.

Maybe Buffy would let him step back into the role as if nothing had changed when he left them. Willow wasn't inclined to be so accommodating.

First though she had to find out what exactly everyone knew. Otherwise, when word got back to Tara all the recriminations would start all over again. Willow really loved the other girl, but she was so prissy when it came to magic.

"Quite. Nevertheless, one would have thought with events of this magnitude that Buffy would have tried to get in touch."

"I don't think she felt there was a secure means to speak to you. As things were actually happening she was probably too busy dealing with them and telling you after the fact probably didn't seem quite so important. Besides, there's hardly been breathing space between one crisis and the next."

"You told her she needed to grow up." Willow's voice made her presence known before she stepped from the shadows. "It's not exactly going to encourage her to be forthcoming with the confidences. It's either going to look like she's needy or she's gloating about not needing you. Either way, you get to be all disapproving."

Giles turned his attention to the not-so-young witch. "I think that assessment is a little harsh. I've seldom criticised any of your choices, a fact that I deeply regret given your recent actions. Perhaps if my guidance had been a little firmer earlier, then we wouldn't find ourselves in our current situation. You were very fortunate that the consequences of your actions were no worse than they have been."

"Let us say that in addition to you, we also picked up the book you were using and an eight hundred dollar quartz that no doubt I would have found deducted from my share of the profits from The Magic Box."

"No, you wouldn't. Not if the spell had worked, and besides you got it back, didn't you?"

"That is beside the point. I am merely making the observation that I am probably more aware of what you have been doing than you might think. Are you really going to tell me you can justify the fact you were about to sacrifice an innocent animal?"

"It didn't count. It wouldn't have happened. And it was for Dawn. Surely Dawn's innocence is more important than some animal?"

"I somehow don't believe that had you explained the options to Dawn that she would have felt her innocence would be preserved by killing a young dog. In fact I'm inclined to believe that she would find the idea somewhat abhorrent.

Which leads me to believe that your motives were rather more to do with what you wanted than what Dawn would have wanted."

"How dare you come back here and try to tell me what to do? You gave up any right you had to interfere in our affairs when you walked out on us. You wanted your "new life". Well, go back and live it. You made it plain that you didn't care about any of the rest of us the first time you left, and then the second time just made it clear you didn't care about Buffy either. Well, if you can't be here when you're needed then don't expect to play the preacher when you do make an appearance.

I think you forget that I'm not some fifteen-year-old anymore. I am an extremely powerful Wicca, and you would do well to remember that you're not powerful enough to want to piss me off."

A fourth voice joined the conversation. "No, Willow, you're not a fifteen year old. You're not even the eighteen-year-old that I fell in love with, and you have no idea how much I wish you were. You're not a Wicca, either. You don't heed any of the teachings. You use magic for all the wrong reasons and you never think of other people or the consequences of your actions. You're certainly a very powerful witch, but you're not a Wiccan.

You're threatening one of the people who mean most to you in this world, just for speaking his own opinion, which happens to agree with mine, so maybe you want to threaten me, too?"

"T-Tara, I didn't know you were here. I'd never have said any of that stuff if I'd known you were around. You know I would never hurt you."

"I was sleeping in Buffy's room until I heard you arguing, and no, Willow, none of us knows that you wouldn't hurt them. You already hurt Dawnie when you took her to Rack's. You know that you hurt me. What you did to me wasn't just a mental violation. It meant when we made love after that it was rape. I thought you had put it behind you, but you just don't get that the things you do are no better than Jonathan and his attempt at being a superhero. It's all self-glorification, and we're all just your puppets.

And whether you would like to hide the side you've just shown to Giles from me or not, it'll still be there. Somewhere along the way, the wonderful, sweet girl I fell in love with has got lost and I'm done setting myself up for more pain by trying to find her because I don't think I ever will."

"Y-you're leaving me again? B-but we just… It was good. I mean we were good. You can't leave. Just think how much Dawnie would miss you…"

"We weren't good enough for you to want to keep things as they were. We weren't even back together for two weeks before you chose power over me. You knew that what you were doing was black magic, and you knew I wouldn't approve. That's why you hid and turned your phone off. And my relationship with Dawnie is for the two of us to work out."

"Willow, don't you understand. There is no 'it' for you to fix. It's you. You're what needs fixing, and you can't just magic it better."

"It's the ageing thing. I can fix the ageing thing. It's simple, just a general reversal spell and I'll be right back. I just did a spell that went wrong. That's all."

"You still don't get it. You could look eighty and be stuck in a wheelchair or something and if you were still the same inside as you were when we met, I'd count myself lucky to push you around for the rest of my life. It's not what you look like. It's who you've become.

That first argument we ever had was because I said you scared me. Well, now, with the possible exception of Xander, I don't think there's anyone who isn't a little bit scared of who you've become. Is fear what you really want from people? Because, personally, I'd rather have friendship and trust."

"Tara, wait!" Willow moved to go after her but was prevented by Giles' hand, which clamped around her upper arm.

"I disagree. I think you've caused her quite sufficient pain for one day, and unless you really are about to start throwing spells in my direction, I would strongly suggest that you leave her alone.

I would also suggest that when you speak to the others you think very carefully before you say anything which would alienate them further than you have already."

Willow turned, trying to stare down the former watcher but finding that it wasn't as easy as she might have thought. The two were still glaring at each other, with Wesley taking a supportive position at Giles' right shoulder when the quiet was broken by the sound of a car pulling up.

Soon Dawn could be heard making encouraging noises, and then a loud whining followed.

"Buffy, what's wrong with her? Why doesn't she want to go in the house? It's like she's scared."

"It's not what, pet, it's who," Spike answered. "Go fetch some of your clothes or something. Not the clean stuff, the more it's got your scent on it the better."

"I guess we work that out when we get there. Even if you sent Red packing tonight her scent would still be all over the place. Thing is I was countin' on bein' able to lock her in the bathroom overnight till we get her housetrained but since that's only a connectin' door away from Red I can't see that workin' too well. I guess it might have to be the basement."

"Well you come up with a better suggestion, then, and bear in mind that you get to clean up wherever it craps or pisses and don't even think about suggestin' it shares a room with us."

Dawn bounded downstairs only to almost bump into Willow and the two former Watchers.

"Guess you didn't manage to screw up the whole world, then. Looks like you did a pretty good job on yourself, though." The teenager's greeting to Willow was terse. She didn't, yet, know any more than she had when Buffy and Spike had taken her to Brandon's, but she knew that the witch had wilfully acted in a way that would hurt Tara, again.

The contrast to her welcome for the two watchers couldn't have been more evident. "Giles, Wes, Buffy got me a puppy. Come meet her. She's kind of scared to come out of the car but she's really sweet."

"Perhaps it might be an idea if you were to retire to your room for now, Willow?" Wes suggested.

Willow's face turned so pale that her freckles stood out as if she had measles. It was one thing for her to shrug off the idea of performing a sacrifice. It was another to deal with an animal who was obviously scared to death of her. Pride dictated she should hold her ground, but in this instance pride lost out. She dashed upstairs even quicker than Dawn had come down.

Wes grimaced. "I'm sure Spike and Buffy will explain before the end of the night. Why don't we see if we can coax your dog into the house?"

Dawn rolled her eyes as she headed out of the house with Wes. "Why am I always the last to find out everything?"

Between the four of them, with Dawn practically burying the dog's nose in her bag of washing, they finally coaxed her into the house.

Dawn's eyes turned to Buffy at this news. "Don't let her make Tara leave, again. Please, Buffy."

"Shh, love. Don't get yourself all worked up. Tara's not going anywhere she doesn't want to. Okay? Now, let someone tell you what you've missed."

Gradually, with bits and pieces from everyone, Dawn got the story of what had happened that night. By the end of the tale the teenager was angrier than any of them had ever seen her and she was holding onto the dog so tightly it was struggling for breath.

She turned to her sister. "Buffy, this house is half mine. Guardian or not, I still have a say in how this house is run, and that bitch is not staying one more night under this roof. And if you don't have the spine to throw her out then I will."

Releasing her grip on the dog she made a dash for the stairs, the speed of her actions causing the scar on her upper thigh to start bleeding again. Buffy was only a couple of steps behind her and Spike was not far behind that, determined to be there for both his girls in the coming showdown. Most surprisingly of all, a grey shadow didn't so much dash as slink up the stairs behind them.

"Get out of that bed!" she screamed at the witch when she saw her lying there. "You don't deserve to touch anything of my mother's. You make me sick. Buffy might not have the guts to tell you that you're not welcome, but I just found out what you did, what you were going to do, and I do.

I want you out of here now. You can come back tomorrow and we'll have your things all packed for you, but for now just get enough stuff for tonight and get out. Go to Xander's. Go to a hotel. Go to hell. I really don't care. Your stuff will be on the porch waiting for you by eleven tomorrow morning, and I suggest that's the last time you pay us a visit."

The redhead turned to Buffy, plainly expecting her to contradict Dawn, but she didn't. Instead, Spike spoke up, his hands firmly on Buffy's shoulders. "Dawn's jumped the gun a bit, I reckon, but the fact of the matter is you've overstepped the line once before and you got a second chance. When it comes to Dawn's safety, nobody gets third chances. We can't have you livin' here any more. It's not a choice Buffy wanted to make, but until you get your act together you're just not safe to be around. 'Course Buffy would have given you long enough to pack, but I reckon since Bit's so determined she'll concede the point.

If you get what you need for tonight together, I'll drop you off at Harris's or Giles' hotel or wherever you want to go.

Come on, Bit. Let’s get that leg of yours fixed up again." Spike turned and pulled Dawn with him. He wasn't surprised when Buffy didn't follow them.