There wasn't room in any of the ambulances for Giles to accompany the students to the hospital, and even if he'd wanted to go, he couldn't. There were still three hours left until the school day was over, and as much as he wanted, he couldn't just leave. Someone would notice. The one time it was important, someone would notice.
Scowling down at the sidewalk and gritting his teeth at the red that stained it—just like the last time, just like the last time he'd been powerless, and so, so stupid—he clenched his hands at his sides, struggling hard to keep his breathing under control.
His heart was pounding inside his chest, and even the weight of his daemon on his shoulder couldn't calm its racing speed.
Her eyes were closed, her breathing steady, her entire focus on the sirens fading into the distance. The sound drifted to him through their bond, just at the edge of his awareness, like the tingle of air over bare skin.
Her hearing was far superior to his, but even she wouldn't be able to hold onto the sound forever.
"Areh," He said, looking up at her, and watching the way the sunlight struck her feathers, "Do you think..." His voice trailed off, and he bowed his head.
No.
No, he wasn't going to do this.
Not again.
Tears burned at the corners of his eyes, and he struggled to hold them back.
At the edge of his awareness, the sirens finally faded into silence.
His mouth twisted itself deeper into a scowl.
"Where did our honored guest say he would be staying?" His gaze once more turned to look up at the great grey owl perched on his shoulder.
Arethousa blinked one of her golden eyes open, and peered down at him, her head tilting very slowly to the side as she contemplated his words. "I seem to recall something about..." She tilted her head again, to the other side, "The harbour." She wilted slightly, pressing her feathers smooth against her back in trepidation. "I can't...it...it's blurry." A tremble ran through her frame, sending the sunlight reflecting off in streaks of grey as her voice trembled, the pain of all the years they'd lived trapped within it, "How could they—they drugged us!"
Betrayal stung at his heart, and he looked away from his daemon, unable to face the raw emotion held out for display in her eyes. They'd thought they could trust the Watcher's Council. They'd thought they'd be able to make a difference. Make up for everything they had done wrong.
They'd thought they would be able to use this second chance they'd been given to redeem themselves of all the evil they had once wrought with such impunity.
But they'd been lied to. They'd trusted the wrong people.
And their—
He cut the thought off before it could complete itself.
Buffy wasn't their daughter. Their actions had proved that. They'd betrayed her. Just like they'd betrayed—
Arethousa's talons digging into his shoulder stopped him from getting lost in his despair. "Stop it." She whispered, "Just stop it now. We-" She was shaking, even as her golden eyes flashed furiously in the sunlight. "We—" She turned her head, and locked her gaze onto his. "You know what we have to do." She said, softly.
He nodded, and hung his head. "We can't allow this to continue." He said, his hands clenching into fists at his sides. "We have to stop them."
She shifted on her feet, and pressed her beak into his hair comfortingly, her breath whispering past his ear, no matter what the cost.
And then she pressed one last kiss to his forehead with her beak, lifted her wings, and launched herself into the air.
They'd learned their lesson long ago. They weren't going to make the same mistake twice.
Rupert Giles watched his daemon fade into the distance for a few moments more, listening with the edge of his awareness as the sound of sirens once more grew in volume until they hummed against his skin like heat waves off the pavement.
Then he turned around, and walked back into the school, where classes were resuming, and students hurried through the hallways, their faces pale and their daemons tensed. He walked past all of them, and into the library.
It was with only the barest moment of hesitation that he pulled one of the ancient tomes from the shelf behind the counter, and let it fall open against his hands. Closing his eyes and willing the strength he had feared for so many of his days to the fire, he whispered the words thrilling against his fingertips from the raw power emanating from the words written in ink the color of blood.
When the sword shining with the light of the stars appeared above the book, he caught it expertly in one hand, shut the book with his other, and pressed the flat of blade against his side.
Like molten fire, it burned with the momentary heat of the sun itself, blazing white-hot and screaming with the voices of a thousand damned souls.
The souls that he had damned. The ones he'd drowned, and beheaded, and sentenced to the fires of hell itself.
Their screams—real only to him—clawed at his heart with their pain, and their fear, until it felt like his ears would bleed and his heart crack in two. But within moments, the blade shrank, and cooled, and the screams quieted, until nothing was left but a heavy, cold weight against his side.
A small dagger, gleaming like ice and darkness, was now strapped to his side by a leather belt that had been stained the darkest midnight imaginable.
For a moment, he contemplated it. The blade itself was crystalline, almost transparent, like quarts, only colder, and completely devoid of ornament or subtly. It was nothing more than it needed to be, its intentions clear.
But the handle was dark as the emptiness between the stars, and swirling with endless loops and half-circles spiraling like the print of his thumb against his hand. Its darkness held the rage within his heart, and the sorrow and pain that conflicted within it.
Against the blade, the darkness almost seemed dominant.
But the transparent, clear intent could not be smothered, and a bitter smile overtook his expression as he let the dagger slip back into its sheathe against his hip.
Against the edge of his awareness, he could hear voices, doctors, nurses, confusion and chaos.
But he had a mission to complete. And only after it was done would he be worthy once more of being in the presence of the one he had betrayed.
So he left the library, tweed jacket hiding the dagger beneath its heavy weight, and went to the principles office to explain that he needed to leave early for the day, because he had just gotten a call that there was a family emergency. The glint in his eye and the absence of his daemon was enough to quell whatever protests Snyder or his meerkat might have had.
And then Rupert Giles went out, got into his car, and started down the road that would lead him to the harbour, the dagger a constant weight at his side, ensuring that he would keep to the path he had chosen.
Because he'd learned his lesson long ago—so long ago that the stories were nothing more than whispers and legends—and he wasn't going to make the same mistake twice.