Title: Soul Cages
Author: Crux
Email: crux@toast.com
Part: 1/? - Vunerable
Rating: R
Summary: Very AUish, Buffy/Spike. In the late 1800s in England, the current Slayer Elizabeth Anne Giles has to fight against the most vicious vampire of Europe, the Council of Watchers and finally herself in order to live her life the way she wants to. Yeah, I may suck at these summaries, but read it anyway ;).
Disclaimer: Not mine (except the plot), so don't sue. No infringement intended.
Distribution: Really? *blush*
Feedback: Would be highly appreciated. So, people, show me some R&R :)!
Author's Notes: My first published fic ever, and yeah, English isn't my native language, so bear with me :). The story is based on a dream I had one night.
The sentences written like **this** are Elizabeth's thoughts and the ones like this are said with an emphasis.
*****
Part One - Vunerable
*****
Miss Elizabeth Anne Giles stood on a deck of the ship, letting the gentle breeze blow against her flaming cheeks and forehead. She gazed towards the moonlit sea, salty tears running down her beautiful face. Usually anybody who met her could see that she was an extremely pretty girl, but none of her normal beauty was evident at the moment. Her blond, curly hair was flat and lifeless, her usually so shiny green eyes empty and haunted and her rosy cheeks blotchy.
"Papa, I miss you so much," she whispered, sniffling. "Why did you have to go? You know I can't manage without you and your help."
She closed her eyes only to see the smiling face of her recently dead father, looking gently down at her and cupping her face with his big, calloused hands. The mental picture made her sob even harder, until her whole body shook and she felt like curling into a tight little ball and crying until the tears would fall no more.
But she didn't. Instead, she just stood by the rail and stared down at the black water. It looked so tempting to her. How wonderful it would be just to jump and let the cold water close herself into its arms. The world would have a new Slayer and she would finally find her peace.
**Be brave, Buffy, my love. Never give up, no matter what difficulties you are destined to face,** she heard her father's voice in her mind. It made her want to scream her heart out, to wail after her loss. It felt like someone had stabbed her, impaled her heart with a rusty knife so that the pain was the only thing left to her.
"I have tried, Papa," she said, a desperate tone in her voice. "I have tried to be brave, just like you asked me to be. But it is so hard, so hard."
She was alone now. Her father was dead, but she could still see him lying in that muddy gutter she had found him in. He had just lain there, naked and dead eyes gazing towards heaven and its thousand stars. His neck had been torn open and his clothes were soaked in his own blood. Killed by a vampire, or by the looks of it, many vampires.
In all her days as a Vampire Slayer, Elizabeth had never vomited, whatever terrible sights she had seen. She had not vomited when she had seen the grotesque pile of decapitated humans after a killing-spree one particulary cruel demon had put up just for his own amusement. She had not vomited after being too late to save two young women from being brutally raped and strangled by seven nasty vampires. But when she saw her father's -- her Watcher's -- abused and torn body, she couldn't help herself. She fell to her knees, coughing, and threw up everything she had eaten in the last few days.
She had sat and cried beside her father until someone had called the authorities and they had come to take him away. She had sat and cried beside her father's grave every day after his funeral. She hadn't smiled, not even once, after his death.
And now she was on her way to England to meet the Council and her future without no one to count on anymore. Her life was like a deep, black wormhole that went on and on with no light visible at the end of the tunnel. She had nothing to live for anymore. No one to talk to, no one to laugh with, no one to hold her hand when she was frightened or in pain. What could the world offer to her anymore? She had already lost everything she had ever loved.
It would be easy, so easy just climb over the rail and gracefully dive into the dark ocean. She knew a death by drowning was not a painless one, but she deserved no better. She had betrayed her father and herself by not being able to save him from dying. It was only fair that she should also die.
**I'm sure the Council'll find a wonderful replacement for me,** she thought and sighed. Then she lifted the hem of her blue skirt and took the first step.
"What is a pretty little lady such as yourself all alone out here for?" a deep, velvety voice boomed from behind her, startling her and making her resolve crumble, even for just one little bit.
She stiffened and turned her head slowly around to see a reasonably young man, maybe around twenty-five, standing right next to her, a cigarette hanging between his lips. He leaned casually against the very same rail as she, looking up at her face.
The man was handsome, Elizabeth noticed. He had brown, curly hair and the bluest eyes she had seen in her whole life. His skin was ghostly pale in the moonlight and it made him look even more sinister. He was dressed in a cream-coloured, tailored suit which was obviously expensive and his whole posture told about his upper-class upbringing.
Elizabeth turned her head away again. "Please, mister, do go away. I beg you to leave me alone. I want to be left in peace," she choked, sobbing quietly and dabbing her tear-filled eyes with a hankerchief she had found from her black purse a couple of minutes earlier. She hated the fact that this man had seen her crying. It was not at all like her to lose it so completely in front of a stranger.
Despite her heart-wrenching plea, the man only smirked unpleasantly and scrunched up his straight, hawk-like nose. "Well, that wasn't very polite, now was it?" he drawled as he flicked his cigarette into the ocean. Then he took a few steps closer, until his right arm was almost touching Elizabeth's side. "Here I see a pretty damsel in distress and decide to help her out, but what does she do?" he whispered. "She orders me to go away, that's what she does. Is that the right way to treat your white knight, pet?"
Something ugly and evil crept up her spine, making her shiver as if cold. The man's tone held an undeniably great amount of venom and she didn't understand it at all. Then she glanced at him again, more carefully this time. It was as if...
"You're not a white knight, not mine nor anybody else's," she stated bluntly as the truth dawned to her. She took a step backwards, stepping away from the rail and the man -- not a man, a vampire -- standing next to her. "In fact, you couldn't be more further from it. You are a monster, nothing more."
The vampire's smirk widened and the hatred radiating from his ice-blue eyes hit her with its full force. His face transformed and Elizabeth saw the demon he really was staring at her with narrowed eyes. "Impressive, truly impressive, my precious Slayer," he hissed, yellow eyes full of contempt and something she couldn't quite recognize. Maybe plain murderous rage? No, she decided, it was something more, something much deeper than that...
"What, you didn't think I'd know your kind?" she asked, her eyes wide with faked incredulosity. "I sensed you the moment you stepped through that door," she said, pointing at the door that led inside. It was a lie, though, but somehow it was very important to her that the vampire didn't know he had seen her in a vunerable state of mind.
The vampire changed back into his human form again and lit himself another cigarette. "Didn't seem like it a minute ago," he mocked. "'Please, mister, do go away. I beg you to leave me alone'," he mimicked her in a high-pitched tone that made Elizabeth see red. "If I didn't know better, pet, I would have said that you were having quite a tragic moment there. Sad, actually." He reached over to her and brushed his long fingers against Elizabeth's moist cheek. "Such lovely tears..."
Elizabeth snatched her head angrily away from his fingers. "Well, what can I say?" she shrugged nonchalantly. "You undead people seem to fall for the 'sweet and innocent and helpless little girl' act every time. I was just waiting for you to step a little closer and..."
"You're lying, pet," the vampire said with a confident smile. "I watched you there for a while. You were going to jump. You were going to kill yourself. Commit a suicide."
"You're wrong," Elizabeth denied weakly. "I wa-wasn't..."
"Horrible way of dying, by the way. Drowning, I mean," he interrupted her. His words were spoken casually, as if they were having a sophisticated conversation about something that interested them both equally much. "I wouldn't recommend it to anybody. You have probably never seen a drowned man before, but let me tell you, it's not a pretty sight." He was idly fiddling with the hem of his coat, as if she was no threat to him at all.
Elizabeth's blood almost boiled. "Well, I guess you have seen drowned or otherwise dead people enough for both of us," she snapped hatefully. "I, on the other hand, prefer to be surrounded by dozens of dusty vampires instead of dead human bodies. It really saves my day, you know?"
She saw his eyes turn almost black and heard him growl hostilely. Then suddenly, his cool mouth descended savagely on hers. Elizabeth gave a little surprised sigh, which he immediately took advantage of by plunging his tongue into the hot cave of her mouth. But that made Elizabeth wake into action again and she pushed him away with violent movements.
"Who are you?" she panted, her face pale and her bosom heaving. A trickle of blood welled from her lower lip because his actions had not been gentle. The vampire leaned towards her and licked it slowly away, an expression of pure bliss on his face.
"Mmm," he whispered, his eyes closed. Then he straightened himself and let go of Elizabeth's upper arms. "William the Bloody, at your service, Miss." The vampire bowed to her, a cruel smile curling his lips. "You might have heard of me. I'm after all, quite famous in my circles. And yours."
William the Bloody? How was it that one of the oldest and most vicious vampires of all Europe had decided to take the same ship towards England that she had? William the Bloody, killer of seven Slayers and probably hundreds of other people, stood there right before her very nose. And she did nothing about it? By God, she had even let him kiss her without staking him when she had had the chance!
He watched as confusion and nervousness creased her pretty little forehead and smiled to himself as he thought about what she was going through at the moment. But suddenly her face was left blank and he frowned himself. What was the bitch up to?
"Well, you decided to harass the wrong girl tonight," she said as she grabbed her trusted old stake from her purse in a lightning speed and pointed it towards the vampire's unbeating heart. "Say goodbye to the eternal night, William."
But before she had time to even think about what was happening, the vampire was once again looming above her, his gameface on and his sharp fangs bared. And before she had time to react to what was happening, he had pressed those fangs against the tender skin on her neck. Just enough pressure for her to feel the tips of them, but not enough to actually break the skin.
"No need for the tough act, Slayer. I can smell it in you," he breathed and the cold air fondling her neck made a shiver run down her spine. "I can smell your want -- no, your need -- to die. It's in your blood. It's calling to me. And I want to help you."
Elizabeth was frozen to her place. Her mind shut down completely and all she could feel was the iciness of his soft lips against her neck, kissing their way down to her shoulder. His grasp on her wasn't tight, she could have broken free anytime she wanted, but she surprised even herself by not doing it. Her stake clattered to the floor and she just stood there, in his arms, waiting for the final darkness to fall and him to sink his fangs into her willing flesh, consuming her whole soul.
"You could be my eighth..." the vampire muttered as he licked her pulse point enticitingly, wetting her whole neck-area with his tongue. To Elizabeth it felt like a big, dangerous cat was crouched upon her, but she kept her stance. "I want you to be my eighth," the vampire continued as he took a step back and nailed her with his stare. "Come with me," he whispered and extended his hand to her. "Come with me and let me make it all go away. I promise it will be quick and painless for you. You won't feel a thing."
What did she have to lose? It wasn't as if she had wanted to die by drowning, no. Despite her brave mask, she was terrified of the pain it would have caused her. But a master vampire's bite...
He was a worthy opponent for her, experienced enough to make her death quick and feared enough to make it seem she had died bravely, perhaps in a fight between the two of them. He was a perfect killer of a Slayer. Nobody would have to know she had surrendered to him willingly.
What did she have to lose?
"Come with me," he whispered again.
Elizabeth stepped forwards and placed her hand into his colder one. Then she let herself to be led away by him.
TBC
So, what do you say? To continue or not to continue? Will I write more or should I just stay home and knit :)? If you liked it, I would be terribly pleased to know...