Chapter Forty-Two
“’m beginnin’ to think we should’ve brought Donna’s book along.”
Buffy made a face as Spike stepped away from the third demon they had come across in the past ten minutes—the third demon that eluded his otherwise encyclopedic knowledge of foreign spirits and legends. There were a few that he had identified—an ekimmu of Assyrian descent and one of the classic British bogeys; this last one was different. A more haggardly but very much ethereal figure with a dead face and long, stringy white hair. Half of these things looked to be incorporeal, but her boyfriend had succeeded in snapping necks and dodging punches. It only served as a testament to how powerful the god had become.
“Donna’s book would’ve helped?” she replied as he wiped his hands on the nearest tombstone. For a thing that didn’t look to be solid, the demon released the foulest smelling blood she had ever encountered—a transparent ooze of some sort that even had the vampire shaking his head in disgust.
Spike shrugged with a dry smirk. “She sat with me while you were sick,” he said. “Don’ know ‘f she knows that she reads aloud when she’s nervous…an’ why she’d be readin’ a ghost book when she’s nervous is beyond me. Sounded like a lot of that rot might’ve been right up our alley.”
“Donna sat with you while I was sick?”
“In case you needed somethin’…or I needed somethin’. Told her it wasn’ necessary.”
Buffy smiled softly and curled her arm around his. “I think she has a bit of a crush on you,” she said.
Spike’s eyes twinkled. “The bird’s completely taken with her wanker of a boss,” he retorted. “God, you’d have to be deaf, dumb, an’ blind to not see it. But even so, I’m a taken gent. ‘Sides, she told me that way back, she an’ Red had a heyday of teasin’ you ‘cause you were smitten with me.”
It was charming to watch her cheeks redden even after everything they had done and confessed. Even now that they were together, mated in a sacred bond, and all but holding hands in a cemetery. As though her crush was something that she still needed to guard herself from. As though he hadn’t felt the same—it being all of two and a half weeks before.
“She told you that?” Buffy asked quietly, eyes glued to the ground. “Well, they were just, you know, giving me a hard time because we weren’t fighting anymore and I was kind of…you know—”
“Sweetheart?” She looked up. “If you’re gonna start playin’ coy, it’s a li’l late, don’ you think?”
A small smirk quirked her lips. “Yeah, yeah. Just didn’t want to give you the wrong impression or anything.”
“What part of a wrong impression? You’ve told me you love me, you’ve claimed me an’—oh wait—shagged my brains out.” The blush in her skin intensified, and he found it adorable. “Are you tellin’ me,” he continued, “that on top of all that, you like me, too? Saucy minx.”
“Well…so have you!”
Spike smiled and brushed a loving kiss across her lips. “That goes without say.”
“Well then, you don’t have to be all superior about it.” A sigh rumbled through her throat and her expression suddenly turned serious. “These demons gaining power—ancient demons that were, you know, folklorey. The kind the Council has never even considered a threat…what…they just—”
“Jus’ keep comin’ an’ comin’,” he agreed, gaze taking a turn about their surroundings as if on suggestion alone another would pop out. “No Faith. More than the soddin’ buruburus, that’s for bloody sure. That ekimmu’s a dangerous breed. If we have those runnin’ around…” His face fell serious, and he turned to her, panicked. “You din’t look at it, did you?”
She frowned. “Why?”
“’Cause those things are bleedin’ hard to exorcise. Don’ remember the whole of it, but they’re allegedly evil spirits that were rejected by the Underworld after bein’ murdered or dyin’ in some ugly, nasty way.” He released a shuddering breath. “Only saw one once before. Dru captured it ‘cause Angelus thought it’d be a bloody laugh riot ‘f we sent one of those buggers into some unsuspecting’s house. It attached itself to the youngest daughter an’ had everyone dead within two days. Did you look at it? If you look at it, you chance gettin’ haunted by it. You—”
“Spike. It didn’t affect you, did it?” He frowned. She placed a hand over her heart. “Not human anymore. In fact…I think when I looked at it—”
“You did look at it!”
“Yeah, and it kinda died. Well, that was either me or you snapping its neck, but I’m fine. It didn’t…I didn’t feel anything.” A lonely look suddenly haunted Buffy’s eyes, and she shivered as they took a turn to leave the cemetery. There was quiet around them, a different kind of quiet than the sort that had fooled them in the past. A vacant cry over nothingness; a signal that whatever demons had lurked in the grounds were moving on to find their next neighborhood to terrorize.
There was no Faith here. Her scent was all over town but the past two hours had led them in circles. Following Spike’s nose and Buffy’s instinct—tearing them in different directions with the same dead ends. As though the other Slayer had transcended the worldly helix and was beyond their physical reach. As though it was already too late.
Spike’s hand dropped to his mate’s, squeezing in reassurance when her thought refused to complete itself. “What’s wrong, kitten? Is it—”
“I didn’t feel anything.”
“Well, prob’ly means the ghostie din’t—”
“What if I can’t feel anything anymore? I’m a god, right? Do gods…do they feel?” They were at the front gate now, and she twisted to face him, a new sheen of tears sparkling her eyes, never far from release with all she had faced. “What if…I feel things. Emotions. I know I love you…and my friends, and…I feel that. But…can I still feel—”
Her direction wasn’t difficult to follow, though he found her sudden concern both heartbreaking and sweet. There would be questions like this for a while, he knew. Questions about everyday things that might change with the results of change. Thus he answered her in the way he knew best; tugged her into his arms and covered her mouth with his. Tasting her for the first time in days in something other than reassurance. In the release of that lust he had all but forgotten when love overwhelmed his worry for her. Now his girl was back, in every sense. And his body missed hers terribly.
He tasted every inch of her mouth. Dueled with her tongue, whispered words against her lips that were for only her to keep. Allowed his hands to find her face, then trace down her body and cup her breasts with soft sensuality that he had never thought to touch again. She was whimpering into his kiss without even realizing it, pushing herself into him, arching her pelvis against his hardness that craved her heat. It couldn’t last anymore than a few seconds. Spike finally drew away, albeit reluctantly, and smiled at the moan of disappointment that rumbled through her throat.
He dipped his head and pressed a kiss to the prominent bite mark on her skin. “Did you feel that?” he asked.
“Uh huh.” There was a dazed tenor to her voice that he took great pride in.
“Then I don’ think lack of feelin’ is anything you need to worry about, kitten.”
Buffy nodded dumbly and tugged his mouth back to hers. From nowhere, it seemed, the silently implied physical distance they had placed between themselves was gone, and it was all right to want one another once more. To want it all.
“Jesus,” Spike whimpered against her lips, head sinking to pepper her throat with wet, ardent kisses. “I never thought I’d feel this again. God, Buffy…”
“Yup,” she replied in a falsetto, cheery tone that both turned him on and tore at his heart. “That’s me. God Buffy.”
There was no way to respond to that; he wasn’t even going to call her on it. Opting instead to bring her attention back to him. “I love you,” he whispered into her skin, one devious hand darting under the hem of her shirt to cup her breast, delighted that she had forgone a bra in her preparations. “I love you so much.” He tweaked her nipple between his fingers, reveling in the throaty groan that rumbled through her lips. “My Buffy…”
“Ooohhh…” Her eyes wedged open with some difficulty, the night air slamming back into her as she remembered exactly where they were and what they had so recently been doing. “Spike?”
He was thoroughly preoccupied in doting his claim mark with sweet little kisses. “Mmm?”
“Maybe we should…go back?”
His mouth suddenly abandoned her skin; not without a sound of complaint. “Must be doin’ somethin’ wrong,” he murmured, obediently removing his hands from under her shirt and helping her straighten up. “Thought you’d be at the ‘only two people in the world’ stage by now.”
“You’re not that smooth an operator, buster.” Her playfulness betrayed her jest.
Spike arched a cool brow. “Yes, I am.”
“Yes you are. But really…” Buffy made a face and gestured to their surroundings. “Just a few minutes ago, we were killing demons. Big, ugly, world-endy demons. And all…” She glanced to him mournfully. “We’re not going to find Faith, are we?”
“Don’ go blamin’ this on me. Our li’l tryst lasted all of five minutes.”
“That’s not what I mean. I mean, we’re not going to find Faith. Not tonight. Not tomorrow. We’re not going to see her.” The Slayer released a deep sigh and glanced around. “Even if we looked under every rock in Natchez, we wouldn’t find her. Giles said it back at the townhouse. She’s gone. She’s gone…but she’s everywhere at the same time. I can feel her—I know you can, too.”
He nodded and brushed the loose locks of hair from her face. “Yeh. Her scent’s all over…an’ like she’s all over. Not like she left an’ went across town. Like she’s here an’ there, too.” He glanced down, wrapping an arm around her waist. “Buffy…”
“I know.”
“I jus’ got you back. I’m not gonna lose you again.”
“No, you’re not.” She clasped her hand in his and tugged him back in the direction of the Wensel House. “You wanna go back now?”
A roguish grin crossed his face but did not quite reach his eyes. He would know that body language anywhere. And for just a little while, it seemed, the world around them could stop existing. The world around them that shuddered at the seams. “I thought you’d never ask.”
If only a little while.
*~*~*
Willow was reclined on her bed, engrossed in reading when Sam knocked tentatively at the door. He had a standing invitation to come and go as he liked, of course, and he knew it; there were simply certain measures of privacy that he opted to leave open to her.
“Yeah,” she called absently, not looking up as he walked in.
“Find anything?”
“No. My eyes are about to issue a complaint to my brain. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve read this passage.” She drew in a sigh and glanced up as he nodded, charmingly befuddled for a reason that completely escaped her. “What’s up?”
“What? Oh…Donna’s trying to get everyone downstairs to do a Christmas exchange thing.”
“Oh.” Right. The Christmas exchange. Shopping with Donna at the vacant Natchez mall on a day that seemed so long ago. The holiday itself had rolled past them at some point. She had given up counting the days once Buffy was infected. Little things like that had ceased to matter. “Ummm…I’ll be down in a minute, ‘kay?”
“Okay.” He fell silent immediately but did not move. Rather stood, fidgety, as she lowered her eyes to the text once more.
That lasted only seconds. Willow heaved a sigh and glanced up again. “Sam?”
“Yes?”
“Whatever it is, you can say it.”
“Whatever what is?”
“The reason you’re standing there, watching me as though I’m gonna disappear.” Willow licked her lips and closed her book, edging upright. “After this Christmas exchange, I need to start researching the non-Cliffy Notey version of the Rite of Thrieve. Then I need to do a few exercises to get myself ready for…that. Again. Is that what you’re—”
“No! Well, yes, but…” He averted his eyes. “I just…the President asked us back in DC while you were unconscious. I didn’t want to leave, but the thing with my job and…I didn’t want to leave.”
Willow blinked at him dumbly. Then, slowly, allowed a long smile to spread across her face. “Oh my God.”
“What?”
“Could you be any cuter?”
Sam flushed and kicked at the ground nervously. “Well, as a matter of fact I can, but that’s not the point. The thing is—”
Willow help up a hand and he immediately fell silent. “The thing is,” she said calmly, “that you work for the President of the United States. I understand that. That and you left me a note with practically every phone number you’ve ever been in contact with.”
“I—”
She reached into her back pocket and whipped out the aforementioned list. “573-725-4664. Beside it you wrote, my second cousin, twice removed.” The uncomfortable look that overwhelmed the man at that only further verified her verdict of cute. “The last thing I thought was that you were bailing on me, okay? Again—President. Kind of a big job. And, you know, you’ve already been away for forever.”
Sam flashed a beaming smile and shrugged. “I just didn’t want you to think…you were unconscious and—”
“Yeah. And it’s okay.” She smiled gratefully and neared to press a light kiss to his lips. “Okay?”
“Okay.” A heavy sigh rolled off his shoulders and he cast his eyes downward. “I’m also…this thing. The Rite of Thrieve thing. You really have to do it again?”
Willow licked her lips and nodded, holding out her hands in a model of scales. “Me,” she said, wiggling her left hand. “The world.” She indicated the other with a thoughtful demonstration of her life in the face of so many others. “I don’t have a choice. It’ll get messy, yeah, but I need to do this. And this time…I won’t be alone.”
“Yeah.”
“Buffy will be right there beside me. God powers and all.”
“Giles said it might kill you.”
A dry smile quirked her mouth. “Giles said any more power might kill me, which is why he, Wesley, and Anya are staying away. They don’t have much, but they have the hint of enough to send me into overdrive.” She shrugged. “I’m not as worried about Buffy’s affect on me as I am the…me plus power thing.”
“Me, too.”
“But in that…Giles doesn’t even know, I don’t think, just how much I can handle.” She released a shuddering breath. “Just how much that last spell gave me. I feel different. More…like anything I touch could…” A pause; she met his gaze and looked away again, suddenly uncomfortable. “Anyway…with the Christmas thing.”
“Yeah.”
“Downstairs?”
He nodded.
“I’ll be down in a minute. Just…” She frowned. “Just give me a minute, okay?”
“Okay.”
The reluctance wracking his body tore at her heart, but she did not call him back as he disappeared through the door and back down the hall.
There were only so many more times that she could do this. Amidst all her hesitation, a knowledge of what would happen when she started. Nothing that she could know, yet did all the same. An innate comprehension.
The world would survive. That resolution refused to waver.
She just didn’t know if she could say the same for herself.
*~*~*
They didn’t make it to the bed.
The first piece of furniture to greet them upon making their way through the back entrance was the recliner positioned in front of the television. She had leapt into his arms and he had somehow fallen into it. And here they were.
For whatever reason, Spike had not seen this as an outcome of the night. Granted, the furthest thing in his mind was complaining, but having Buffy in his arms, her head resting at his shoulder, his cock buried within her warmth—he had not expected it. Not today. Not so soon. Not with his body still healing from wounds inflicted just yesterday.
He would trade it for nothing, though. This peace. This wholeness of being. A union made for the sake of affirmation and a growing knowledge that their time together could know a radical end in the next few days. She was in his lap, shuddering breaths wracking her body. Sweat glistening her perfect skin as she moved over him in long, languorous strokes. Her hands were at the back of the chair, gripping as though she feared touching him for balance. His own took chart down her back, whispered through her hair, cupped and massaged her breasts and settled on her hips.
She was weeping into his shoulder, drawing him in as deep as she could. And weeping.
There were many aspects of the female hormones that he would never understand, but that didn’t stop them from breaking his heart. And being as learned as he was, he knew to distinguish tears of reaction from tears of sorrow.
At the same time, the small, incomprehensible sounds she was making drove him mad with desire that could never be quenched. Not even when he was inside her.
Spike lowered his head, planting wet, teasing kisses along the columns of her throat. “Sweetheart,” he whispered, “talk to me.”
Her Slayer muscles contracted, wrangling a long moan from his throat. “What do you want me to say?”
“Anythin’. Jus’ anythin’. Please, jus’ talk.”
She pressed a kiss to her claim mark and he shuddered against the urge to come at contact alone. It amazed him that she didn’t know how much power she really had over him. How the slightest touch could affect him so. And that to know that she was crying drove a stake through his heart—the sort that didn’t make him explode, just sat there with the intent of prolonging his torment. “You feel so good,” she whispered at last. “So…so good.”
“You feel wonderful,” he replied earnestly, head dipping to draw a nipple into his mouth. It was an understatement. His time with her before had been brilliant, but this surpassed all else. The sensation alone threatened to blind him with ecstasy. Like touching heaven but from a distance. Knowing flawed perfection—holding it as close to him as the world had deemed possible. “Buffy…”
“I just…I…”
Spike slithered a hand between them. “I know, baby. It’s all right.” He captured her clit with a rapturous sigh, massaging her needy bundle with in soft yet speedy strokes. And when she found her release, it triggered his in a way he had never before experienced. As though he felt her pleasure along with his. A burning fire in the pit of his stomach that roared and sparked and died to a slow sizzle without ever extinguishing. He didn’t realize how hard he was panting until he felt her hand tilt his chin upward, the wonder in her eyes reading the same for what he felt. A reverberation of her name screamed in euphoric release faded just as he identified the voice as his own. And he was left in repose, staring in awe at the miracle in his arms.
“Oh Jesus,” he gasped finally, resting his brow against hers. “Are you all right?”
It seemed such a silly question, and he didn’t know—in truth—if he was asking for the tears that stained her cheeks or the bubble of rapture that refused to know silence.
“Buffy?”
A sob crinkled through the air and she tugged him close. “I love you so much,” she whispered, pressing a kiss to his throat. “And God, I’m so scared.”
Spike drew in a deep breath, running his hands soothingly down her back. The admission tore his heart to ribbons. It was crashing now. The reality of everything. What had happened to her; what was happening now. That desperation between needing to save the world and needing to be human. Needing to feel something other than the loom surrounding them.
“We’ll be fine,” he promised ardently. “You really think I’m gonna let you go now?”
“I’m a god,” she whispered. “This should be easier.”
“’S never easy, pet,” he replied, dropping a kiss on her shoulder. “Never will be.”
“It needs to be more. If the world ends—”
“It won’t.”
Buffy shook her head and drew back, wiping at her eyes. “How can you be so sure? This is a thing that has the power to make other gods and…well, turn me into one…and Willow’s dealing with more magic than ever before and—”
“’m sure ‘cause the world has never ended on an apocalypse that you an’ me teamed up to fight.” That earned him a grin. “We’ll make it. All right? Then you an’ I’ll go back to SunnyD, find someplace cozy, an’ spend the rest of eternity shaggin’ an’ killin’ evil things.”
A ghost of a smile touched her face. “Evil things?”
“Present company excluded?”
“You’re not evil, Spike.”
A mock-wounded glare fell over his face. “Am so!”
“Sweetie…no.”
“’m very evil, I’ll have you know. I’m so evil that…” His eyes softened at the mirth bubbling behind hers. “You’re adorable.”
“Oh yeah. Evilest of the evil, you are.”
“Don’ know why I put up with you, really.”
With a small smile, she clenched her Slayer muscles, calling attention to the intimacy of their connection and coaxing a long whimper through his throat. “I have a few ideas.”
Spike’s eyes rolled up as his head lulled back. “Fuck.” His hands hooked under her hips and lifted her off his erection, then down again with a sharp gasp. “You feel so fucking good. God, I love you so much.”
“So good,” she whimpered, her eyes glazed with pleasure. “God, Spike…”
“Mmm…”
It could have gone on forever. This simple bliss of being. Rejoicing their love with the oldest dance known to man. It could have easily—they could have forgotten everything for the joy of being together. However, the outside world would not wait for them to enjoy their sanctuary.
Donna was at the front entrance by the kitchen, knocking tentatively, calling inward about some gift exchange and how everyone was meeting in the parlor.
Spike’s eyes went wide and his thrusting hips came to an abrupt standstill. Buffy’s sharp gasp of complaint sounded instantly; too loud for the blonde outside to not have heard, or recognize what she had just interrupted. And for as well as the vampire had come to know Donna—in the past few days especially—he could practically see her skin flush.
“Don’t stop,” the Slayer pouted, moving against him frantically. “Spiiike!”
He clamped a hand over her mouth, his other hand dropping to her center. “We’ll be there in a second!” he called, flashing his girl an apologetic look. He waited while Donna went through her internal debate on the wisdom of leaving them unsupervised, capturing Buffy’s clit with his thumb and forefinger, suckling her throat with a murmur of content.
It took a few seconds, but a wave of resignation washed over Donna and she spun around to return to the main house. “Okay,” she said. “But we’re starting now.”
“Yeah.”
The minute she was gone, Spike released a low, guttural growl and lifted Buffy off the chair, still firmly enveloped in her warmth. “Thought she’d never leave,” he moaned, capturing her mouth as he fell back to the ground, and began thrusting into her with a frenzy.
“Uhhh…”
“So sorry, sweetheart,” he panted heatedly, tweaking her nipples between his fingers. “Gonna make it up to you.”
“Spiiike…”
“Fuck. You’re so warm.” His mouth dropped to her throat, planting hot, ardent kisses across every inch of skin. “So tight. God, Buffy, I love you so much.”
A strangled whimper rumbled through her lips.
“I…Spike—the thing…the—”
“Fuck the party,” he rasped, blowing a cool stream of air against a breast before drawing it into his mouth. “Let ‘em wait.”
There was this for the first time. A frantic need—a reminder. Buried there beneath the fear. Beneath the concerns for tomorrow. A need for each other beyond all other.
A need to forget before the world came rushing back.
*~*~*
As it turned out, everyone who had gone shopping—whether with the intention of purchasing Christmas presents or not—had all bought Toby the same thing. Thus by the end of the trade, he had a respectful pile of bouncy balls gathered in the corner.
“When people ask you what I like,” he said to Sam after enduring another round of ball jokes, “you do know that I have, you know, hobbies.”
Donna frowned. “You have hobbies?”
A pause. “Not really, no.”
Willow shrugged and laughed a little. “Sam said you like balls.”
At that, Wesley, Giles, and Xander burst into childish giggles. The same giggles that came to an end just as rapidly with the death glare the Communications Director shot in their direction. “Sorry, sorry,” the elder Watcher hurried to apologize, holding up the bottle of wine he had purloined from the dining room. “A tad tipsy.”
“This is a reassuring thing to hear from our demonologist on Apocalypse Eve,” Josh noted dryly, admiring the tie that Donna had purchased for him.
“How would you like to spend your apocalypse?” Giles retorted, arching a brow.
“Toby’s playing with balls,” Xander noted, inspiring the Watchers to giggles once more.
“When the world ends,” Toby said dryly, bouncing a ball in Harris’s direction, “you better be the first to go.”
“Oh, I can hold my own, my friend.”
Anya shrugged. “Ten bucks says he’ll be hiding behind me the whole time.”
“Ahn!”
“So says the former demon that fled at the last apocalypse,” Wesley observed, earning a snicker from said former demon’s companion.
Willow snickered and elbowed her boyfriend whom had yet to draw his eyes away from the pocket watch she had finally selected for him on their shopping excursion. It wasn’t a gift she was entirely proud of, but at Donna’s suggestion, something he would truly enjoy. “Do you really like it?” she asked for the millionth time. “Because—”
He smiled warmly and kissed her forehead. “Yes. Really, really yes. It’s perfect.”
“Hey,” Josh said, suddenly interested. “Does it have a compass? You know, ‘cause it being us, we could really use those when we actually get out of here.”
“Presuming there’s a place to go once this is over,” Donna added. “And an ‘us.’”
Willow smiled sadly but refused to think in those terms. Joking about the impending apocalypse was fine. Acknowledging it as an inevitability was something she wanted to save for morning. “So,” she said, turning to Josh. “Did you like your…thing?”
He arched a brow and reached for the snow-globe that she had purchased on a whim. “Sure,” he said, turning it over to set the miniature Christmas scene in full snowy action. “One thing, though.”
“What?”
“I’m Jewish. And this…” He held up her gift. “Is not.”
“Hey! I’m Jewish!”
“Yes, and you should be ashamed of yourself.”
Sam scowled. “Josh—”
“It’s a non-denominational snow globe, I’ll have you know.”
“Yeah. I can tell that by the way the Santa is holding a menorah. Oh wait, no.” He frowned and pretended to inspect it. “Those would be sleigh bells.”
“Oh, give it a rest, you two.” Toby rolled his eyes. “Josh, the last time you went to Temple, you were in grade school. And you…” He pointed at Willow. “Don’t even get me started on you.”
“And really,” Donna intervened. “Please don’t.”
“Shut up, Cat-Woman.”
Giles bowed his head and sighed. “Oh thank God.”
“What?”
“Buffy and Spike are here.”
Immediately, Donna’s indignant look vanished and her flush returned by suggestion alone. The arrival, however, was oddly timely. There wasn’t a person in the room that wasn’t grateful for the interruption.
“’Lo all,” the vampire greeted. “Sorry we’re late.”
“No we’re not,” Buffy replied, unapologetic.
“No we’re not, but we were goin’ for polite there, luv.”
“And maybe a tad less obvious,” Xander suggested, though oddly good-natured about it. “Come. Sit. Be merry with us.”
“Yeah. Merry’s a word I’d use to describe this,” Toby drawled.
Spike smirked wryly and grabbed a seat on the floor, tugging Buffy unceremoniously into his lap. “Aside the festivities,” he began, “do we know anythin’ different?”
“Only that the world around Quirinias will be cast into darkness before he awakes,” Wesley replied. “‘And so begins a thousand years of famine, a thousand years of blood and turmoil and destruction.’ And sod all to the rest. Babies will be born with their eyes insight out. Cats will birth litters of snakes. Dogs will voluntarily wear those insidious costumes that humanity created as another means of degradation. Honestly, these gods can’t think of an original apocalypse to save their immortal arses.”
The room quieted and stared at him as though he had announced that he was Thomas Edison. An uncharacteristic break from protocol, but he did not look the least bit apologetic.
“Must be the wine,” he said, grabbing the half-empty bottle from Giles’s grasp.
The elder Watcher frowned and made a play to seize it back, but the younger man had already edged far enough away that the effort to move was not worth the reward. “Yes,” he agreed a minute later. “That and the ankou has to arrive.”
Buffy frowned. “The what?”
“Ankou. Found another culture this god’s a big…god in.” Giles winced and shook his head. “At this point, I’m wondering if he didn’t assume the name Yahweh and talk a bunch of wandering morons into believing a man he bestowed with godly powers was going to be crucified just because he felt like being nice.”
“Quirinias is God?” Donna whimpered. “Well, there go my beliefs.”
Giles flashed her an apologetic glance. “He’s a god, my dear. Just like the bloody rest of them. Yahweh simply got lucky and had a mass following thanks to a drunken Roman Emperor.”
“And if your beliefs haven’t been thrashed by now, then we’re not trying hard enough,” Xander added.
“Kind of like Dracula,” Anya said helpfully. “He’s a vampire that everyone has heard of, but he’s not as powerful as other vampires. He just has more notoriety.”
Josh held up a hand. “Whoa. Wait. Dracula?”
The ex-vengeance demon nodded. “Yes. Vlad the Impaler? I trust you’ve heard of him.”
Buffy’s eyes widened appraisingly. “Wow. He’s really exists? Cool.”
“No, pet,” Spike berated softly. “I assure you, very much not.”
“Dracula’s real?” The Deputy Chief of Staff was completely befuddled. “Okay. You’re just having a little fun now, aren’t you?”
“Oh, I wish, mate,” Spike drawled, reaching for his cigarettes. “That wanker’s needed a good stakin’ for centuries. Let out how to kill us, an’ became a soddin’ celebrity in the process. Hate to think of what he’s made in merchandising alone.”
“Merchandising?” Giles asked, wide-eyed.
“Well, think about it. If you were as bloody infamous as the Count, wouldn’t you want a li’l piece of the monetary action?” The vampire quirked a brow as he lit up, inhaling deeply. “But Demon Girl’s right. Drac has the fame, sure, but he’s such a sodding sissy that Harm would pose more a threat. Has his lackeys do all the work for him. Jus’ dwells in his notoriety.”
“I swear,” Josh said, shaking his head. “When we get out of this, I’m going to need extensive therapy.”
“Like you didn’t already,” Donna quipped.
Buffy licked her lips, snuggling back into Spike’s arms. “Anyway…” she said. “Not that all of that wasn’t fascinating, but…the thing?” She seized the bouncy ball that had formerly ricocheted off Xander and bounced it off Giles’s head, sending its course appropriately back to its owner. “You said we would know when Quirinias was going to rise because of a whatchamacallit?”
He frowned a bit as his tipsiness battled his memory. “Ah yes,” he said a minute later. “The ankou. It’s a Celtic death omen, traditionally the last person of the year that dies is given the mission of collecting the souls of the dead for the duration of the next year. In this instance, the ankou serves Quirinias by not only collecting the souls, but—”
“Forking them over?” Willow guessed meekly as she nudged Donna to hand Buffy and Spike their present. The last to be given.
“So it would seem.” Giles sighed. “The ankou, as described, is fairly distinguishable. Sort of like the Christian ideal of Death only with long silver hair and a skeletal face that can revolve and, by doing so, see everywhere.”
Spike went rigid, his eyes finding Buffy’s; her hands having frozen on undoing the sloppy wrap job on their Christmas present. “You’re sure?” he asked a minute later.
“I only know what the books tell me.”
“Then I killed it. Tonight. Right between the ekimmu an’ that soddin’ bogey. It dropped dead.” The room fell quiet. “Well, I snapped its neck. Got puss an’ ooze everywhere. But I killed it.” He frowned when the Watcher didn’t automatically reassure him, eyes widening to panic. “Din’t I?”
Giles expelled a deep breath. “The ankou cannot die, Spike.”
“Died real enough to me,” Buffy muttered, but her face was white. “Oh God. How? How can it be already? Faith couldn’t have been infected already. She—”
“We felt her all over town, luv,” Spike reminded her lowly. “There might’ve been a reason for that.”
“Power juiced him,” Willow affirmed numbly, her eyes empty. “Oh God. Oh…”
“But—”
“You felt her all over town?” Xander demanded. “And yet…?”
“It wasn’ the kinda feelin’ you follow, Harris,” the vampire retorted. “Seemed like she was right beside you an’ on the other side of town at the same time. We couldn’t bloody well track her. ‘S why we came back. Well…” He quirked a small smile. “One of the reasons we came back.”
The room settled into a reflective silence.
Suddenly, it was real. Suddenly it really was the eve of the apocalypse.
Suddenly they were faced with the possibility of it being their last on Earth. And here they were. Sitting together, an unlikely group of even more unlikely friends. Trading belated Christmas presents while weighing the knowledge that this time tomorrow, the Wensel House could likely be nothing more than a mark in history. A mark in the universe alongside many that no longer existed.
Buffy suddenly chuckled humorlessly, and the sound pierced through the silence like the wail of a child being slowly strangled. “Look, sweetie,” she said, holding up their unwrapped gift. “Willow and Donna got us handcuffs.”
“Sweetheart—”
“No. We have to…we have to go now.” She had jumped to her feet the next minute, eyes leveling with Giles. “Natchez will fall into darkness? I’m assuming this will be during the day so that we can safely rule out that the apocalypse is going down now while we get drunk and exchange Christmas presents.”
It was Wesley who answered; her Watcher was staring off into space as though having realized exactly what they were walking into. “It will be six,” he said, oddly certain. “Six o’clock tomorrow.”
Josh frowned. “How do you know?”
“The text…when it happened before with the other Slayer…because it was during the sixth hour of the crucifixion that there came darkness. The sixth until the ninth.” He shrugged. “It seems Quirinias has an affinity for irony.”
“Told you he was bloody Yahweh,” Giles muttered, running a hand over his face and sobering slightly from the line of tipsiness. “Right, then. I suppose we have the Rite of Thrieve to put together and prepare between tonight and tomorrow at six o’clock. Willow?”
“Right. Upstairs. With the…practicing.”
“Yes. Buffy…” He turned to her, a somber expression clouding hazy eyes. “I need you to get into a mental place of allowing Willow to tap into whatever power you hold. We’re going to need you.” He sighed and turned to the group. “We also need a third. Someone to complete the three. Someone…”
Josh fidgeted a bit as the Watcher’s eyes landed on him. “What?”
“Perfect.”
He blinked. Then stared. “What?!”
“What?” Donna, Sam, and Toby echoed.
“I’m not going to leave it to you to volunteer each other. Josh will complete the three.” He held up a hand with a wry smile as the man opened his mouth to protest. “Relax,” he said. “All you’re going to do is sit there as Willow performs the spell. Your job is to sit and do nothing. Can you do that?”
“Why me?”
Wesley shrugged. “It had to be one of you,” he explained. “Someone with absolutely no familiarity with magic. None whatsoever. Nothing that could potentially add to the strength that Buffy will be channeling.”
“And not—oh say—Xander?”
“Xander’s lived on the Hellmouth. We’re not taking our chances.”
“But why me?!”
“Because I don’t have time for you four to bicker over who does it,” Giles retorted. “Josh, you’re it. The rest of you are in the circle. All right?”
“But—”
“Oh, give it a rest, Curly,” Spike snapped. “You’re gonna be in the bloody safest spot of all. The rest of us’ll be in the circle around you while Rupert chants in Latin. All you have to do is sit with the two strongest people in the soddin’ state. An’ somehow, you find it within yourself to complain. Unbloodybelievable.”
“The safest spot?” A worried look overwhelmed him. “No. No, it shouldn’t be me. Have Donna do it.”
Giles shook his head as Josh’s assistant stared at him in awe. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I would. I want to. But there’s…I have reason to believe…Donna might pose a threat.”
Josh reeled in astonishment. “What?”
Toby and Sam exchanged a look.
Donna blinked, snapping out of her softened awe with a bitch-slap from reality. “Huh?”
“It’s nothing I can…look. We have until tomorrow to prepare.” Giles nodded at the redhead. “And unless we all cooperate, it won’t bloody well matter who is where. Buffy, Willow, Josh—you are the three. Our makeshift sorcerers and warlocks. The rest of us…” He turned his eyes upward. “We have until tomorrow.”
Tomorrow. A sleep away from the end of the world. A simple sleep away.
A sleep in which no one in the Wensel House would get any rest. Not now.
Not when they were standing on the edge of hours away from nothing at all.
TBC