Originally Posted 12/3/13 Revised and Re-Posted 12/5/13
Note: Fasten your seatbelts we have now come to the true start of the story and it is a long and bumpy ride. Enjoy. ;)
Note 2: I have gone back and revised this chapter to read more smoothly so if you already read it there is nothing new here.
The Red Witch
Chapter 5
Faith was pretty pissed. Buffy's stellar plan turned into a complete clusterfuck, but maybe she was being a little hard on Buffy. After all Faith was fully behind Buffy's plan aside from one minor detail and it was probably one she herself would have come up with had she been asked to provide a plan. Sighing Faith leaned against the wall next to Tara away from Buffy and Anya. Tara was looking as tired and sad as a puppy that had been kicked one too many times then left outside in the rain, but at least she gave Faith something to think about other than the fact that she was confined in a small space with fourteen other women. Just like prison. Well Faith thought to herself at least we've got the best seats in the house for the destruction of Sunnydale, couldn't have paid for a better one. There was the small extremely unlikely chance that Xander and Spike would break from their info gathering mission and rescue them or that Giles would have made it to Peru have found the girl and be even at this moment on his way back to Sunnydale to rescue them. However, the boys had no actual way of knowing that a rescue was necessary and given that it had only been about eight hours or so since Giles left she wasn't gonna hold her breath waiting for him to show. They would have to get themselves out somehow. How did they end up in this position anyway these demons were supposed to be total pansies.
Five hours earlier...
Faith watched skeptically as Buffy sent Xander and Spike on a mission to locate any and every detail they could about the life and times of Father Psychopath and the First. Those two alone together was a recipe for disaster. If Xander didn't bring Spike back in a plastic baggie then Spike would be dragging Xander back in pieces. Faith thought Buffy would have been better off sending either Spike or Xander with one of the juniors or even sending one with the both of them to referee any fights. But Buffy had other ideas for the potentials and she needed to send someone who could take care of themselves and who knew what to look out for. Tara and Anya were needed here so that left those two unfortunately. At least they could be counted on to do what they were sent out to do even if this part of the plan was bound to end in death or something.
Once the vamp and the boy wonder had been sent on their way Buffy assigned two of the strongest potentials and two of the newest to babysit Shannon until she was ready to be released or until Buffy released them from that duty. The four of them would be armed and should be able to handle themselves and Shannon would no doubt appreciate the company since none of them could have their families near. She then split the other twelve girls into two groups one under Faith's command and the other with Buffy then it was decided that Tara would join Buffy's group and Anya Faith's so that each group had a magic user who could help track their quarry. The needed the numbers for the confrontation that would occur if either group ran into the demons since a band could have up to fifteen members. The problem in this stage of planning however was Dawn.
Buffy and Faith seriously disagreed on this point. Buffy wanted Dawn safe which was understandable. Tara had informed them that she was not powerful enough to be useful for portal creation so assuming that the Wouj Trezor knew how to read power they would not be after her. Dawn however was just powerful enough to be attractive to them. Her status as the key even if she was in human form gave her a magical energy that would more than satisfy the requirements, in fact as the key she was meant to be used for portal creation. So even if Dawn herself was never able to tap into this mystic energy she could be used by anyone else who knew how. Buffy's plan to keep Dawn out of the picture by either by leaving her home alone or forcing her to stay at the hospital was silly. The two slayers got into a fight over this that was almost physical because Dawn wished to go with them and Faith agreed that she should.
The safest place for Dawn would be near Buffy. Leaving her home alone or with the slayerettes would just be inviting the demons to kidnap the kid. At least out with them Dawn was in a large group that was highly armed and had a slayer for backup even if they were going towards the demons. After all like the kid said she was older than Buffy was when she first went out slaying and it was better for her to be helpful with them than vulnerable alone. Of course if the demons wanted her then it wouldn't matter much either way because they would attempt to attack her in any case and Buffy or someone else would still have to save her. But you'd think that she told Buffy to hand Dawn over to the demons by the way Buffy looked at Faith, still in the end Dawn and Faith got their way if only because Tara agreed with them.
Since the locator spell Tara and Anya did was unable to give them a location for their demons they were forced to take the two groups and attempt to track the demons starting where they were most likely to be given what they wanted to do. It took Faith and her group four hours to locate the abandoned two story warehouse that the demons had set up shop in. A very long and frustrating four hours because Anya's tracking charm was as little help as her locator spell. Faith called Buffy to give her the location but having started out on the opposite side of town it would take Buffy's group some time to reach them so Faith was prepared to wait before making a move at least until they were able to figure out how many demons there were and how far into the spell they'd gotten. However, they didn't have time to even attempt to spy on the place properly before they were ambushed.
The three demons Faith saw in the cemetery that night were barely taller than she was with reddish brown skin and stubby ivory horns poking through the coarse and curly dark brown hair on their head. They were built like runners with lean musculature, they wore what looked like rough-spun dark cream cloth pants and a shirt of the same material that was little more than two strips of fabric crossed over the chest in a v shape and no shoes. Those three demons she saw then inspired no fear at all if they had been hornless she could easily have mistaken them for human teens. In fact when she first saw them she had assumed that they were human teens until she saw their faces. The ones who snuck up behind her group were very, very different. These eight were much older and taller than the first ones and not a one of them was under 6'2". Their horns were twice as long as the others as well as their hair, which flowed wild and untamed down their backs. These guys were built solidly with well defined and bulging muscles and they were a deeper shade of red-brown than the others. They wore only black cloth pants with a rope belt and dagger as well as necklaces made from shells and bones, they would never be mistaken for human and they scared the crap out of Faith with how easily they were able to take her down.
For all her slayer strength Faith was barely a match for two of them. She was unable to see how well Anya and the girls were doing because she was fighting on the defensive unable to get in a strike of her own until one of her opponents was knocked off balance a little by a well thrown rock from Rona. At that point she was able to concentrate on her opponents and turn the tide. She would have won that battle if it wasn't for the demon that came up from behind her and knocked her unconscious.
When Faith regained consciousness she and the others were locked in the rear quarter of the warehouse's ground floor. At first she could see nothing that was holding any of them in that spot granted they were in an area far from any doors, but she couldn't see anything aside from the three walls that surrounded them which kept them in place until she tried to move towards the front of the warehouse. Anya tried but was unable to grab Faith before she ran smack dab into an invisible energy barrier, a force field and oh did that hurt like a bitch. Faith was just barely able to keep herself from screaming out loud as she rebounded away from the barrier but she couldn't completely stop a verbal expression of her pain as she fell to the floor. "Shit, shit, motherfucker!"
"That is a demon barrier" Anya said as she moved to help Faith get back on her feet. "No one but a demon permitted by the caster will be able to cross it. That big one with all the body art is their magician and he also seems to be the leader. He cast the barrier."
"I thought these bastards were not magical." Faith said angrily, rubbing her aching backside which she had fallen on very hard.
"So did I." Came the succinct reply.
"Why can't we hear them" asked Rona who was covered in very painful looking bumps and what was sure to be a lot of bruises.
"It is part of the magic of the barrier we can't hear them and they won't hear or see us unless tattoo guy wants them to. And any non-demons on the other side of that barrier won't be able to see or hear us either." replied Anya tersely.
It was now that Faith finally took a good look at the other girls trapped with them behind the barrier. All of them were banged up pretty badly even Anya. There was a lot of bruising, black eyes, split lips, and many scratches from sharp claws however there were no broken bones or serious injuries. It seems their demon friends went easy on them, which pissed Faith off more to know that. That she had been taken down by demons that were going out of their way to not use excessive force on them. These were no fangless losers they were warriors, so some voyeuristic Englishman got all his info about these particular demons very wrong and that was going to cost Faith and her group. She had no idea what the demons wanted from them but she respected them more now than she had before. And she was left to wait on a rescue from Buffy.
Faith watched the warriors gathered at the east wall of the warehouse there were fourteen altogether six teenagers and eight mature ones including the leader. The room was empty save a few leftover pallets, some wooden crates and a plastic folding table and lots of dust. The demons had taken some of the empty crates to make one long table which they had perpendicular to the east wall, on it lay a very large and very dead pig whose throat had been cut to the bone. Under the pig's neck was a large Tupperware bowl into which blood still dripped. Faith watched for nearly half an hour as the tattooed demon warrior used a paint brush to cover the east wall in a series of runes that spiraled counterclockwise, with the pig's blood. Already on the wall was another series of runes in what looked to be black paint these lay in a square formation around the area where the blood runes were being drawn. Altogether the runes would cover the wall entirely. Halfway done the leader stopped painting and turned to one of the older demons who had a large blue stone on his shell and bone necklace. The leader spoke to him rapidly then blue stone pointed out nine warriors including two of the teens as well as himself and the left the building through one of the doors on the west wall.
Fifteen minutes later the demons returned with Buffy's group in hand two of the potentials as well as Buffy were unconscious and were being carried in, the others were being marched in their hands restrained by their captors. Tara had one of the demon's rope belt tied around her head in such a way that a knot of it was forced between her teeth preventing her from speaking. "Well so much for being rescued by Buffy" one of the Potentials standing behind Faith said morosely. Faith could only agree. The tatted demon walked over to the barrier and placed a hand on it, without getting shocked, as one by one the demons shoved their new prisoners behind the barrier even the unconscious ones. However when it came to Dawn's turn to be shoved in as she was the last one the leader stopped her guard and gestured towards the wall. Faith untied Tara's rope bond as she watched two of the teenage demons hog-tie Dawn and place her near the empty folding table. Buffy began to stir as the demons went back to the east wall and the leader worked on his painting.
Dawn was beginning to wish that she'd listened to Buffy and stayed home or had gone with the other girls to sit with Shannon. It was very uncomfortable to be hog-tied and forced to lay on a very dusty, dirty and cold concrete floor. She watched as the tattooed demon finished up his rune drawing and the other demons gathered up their supplies from the second floor and piled them near the crate table. The tattooed demon done with his painting, placed his bowl and brush on the crates near the pig he then pulled a large light blue gem from his pocket. The other demons scrambled to put space between them and the tattooed guy as he began to chant in a language Dawn had never heard. As she watched the black paint runes began to glow lightly but the blood runes remained stubbornly dark.
The tattooed demon stopped his chant after a few minutes passed in which the blood runes still failed to glow and looked angrily at the wall. He then gazed at the wall for a few minutes as if wrestling with a decision then he turned to his demon buddies and spoke to them in another language Dawn had never heard before. One of the younger demons went to the pile of supplies that had been gathered and pulled out two new Tupperware bowls. The tattooed leader then turned to Dawn and picked her up off the floor placing her onto the plastic table. Dawn suddenly got a very bad feeling about this when she saw bowl boy coming her way so she began to squirm and scream out for Buffy. Looking toward the rear wall where she was sure they'd put her sister she began to scream louder. "Buffy! Buffy! Tara! Buffy!"
The leader untied her and before she could kick him and try to run another demon one of the young ones came and held down her legs two more held her hands while the leader pulled her until her shoulders were just barely off the table. Her arms were pulled then tied, each to a separate table leg, so that they were strained down making her shoulders ache badly though her arms were not tied tightly enough to keep her completely immobile. Her legs were tied off to the other end of the table though they were tied first together. Dawn screamed as best she could in the awkward position they had her tied in. Then as she saw the leader with the bowls and the knife she began to cry. "Buffy! Buffy! Mommy! Mommy! Willow!"
On the far side of the barrier Buffy was beating herself bloody thrashing against the force field attempting however fruitlessly to get through it to her sister, nothing Faith or the potentials tried stopped Buffy from hurting herself. In fact trying to stop her only resulted in two broken arms, broken and fractured ribs, and lots of bruising among the girls as well as Faith's broken nose, two black eyes and a rather sore and aching belly which would probably bruise very badly if she didn't have internal bleeding from the force of the kick she took. Faith held her belly with a sore arm as she searched vainly along the three solid walls for any way out of their prison. The girls who were still conscious and mobile helped her each searching for any way that would lead out to Dawn.
Anya sat atop Tara who was just as crazed as Buffy but lacked the slayer strength to overpower the ex-demon so she could throw herself against the energy barrier. Anya watched the demons from where she was while struggling to come up with any spell that she could use to open the barrier. She tried whatever she came to mind whether or not she had the necessary ingredients whether or not the spell was actually relevant to their situation. But nothing she did affected anything beyond the energy field and nothing that worked actually did anything useful. So they were all forced to watch as the demon leader cut Dawn's wrists and caught her blood in the two bowls. After a short period of time Dawn began to move weakly upon the table then stopped moving altogether.
Buffy stopped fighting and sank to her knees on the floor and vomited harshly, blood showing among the remnants of her lunch. She then curled in a ball on the floor and sobbed. Tara ceased fighting Anya and stared forward blankly no longer seeming to see anything. Faith pulled Buffy into her lap and stroked her hair offering the other slayer what little comfort she could. Anya with tears streaming down her face held Tara and the potentials looked on the gruesome scene before them with various expressions of shock and horror.
The tattooed leader took both bowls and with a fresh brush began painting over the old runes with the new blood. The blue stone demon tore the cloth shirt from one of the younger demons and used it to bind Dawn's wrists he then cut her bonds and lay her fully upon the table. As he turned away from the wall he happened to glimpse a shadow emerging from the gloom that cloaked a corner of the west wall. As he turned toward it for a better look it resolved into a human woman. A long flame haired woman wearing black leather pants and heeled boots, a blood red silk shirt under a long black leather jacket and a black chocker with a silver raven pendant on it. This woman's eyes burned bright green with an inner fire and as he stared others who saw him staring turned to look and seeing her they began to stare as well. She began to walk slowly towards them and the blue stone felt fear in a way he had not since he was first blooded a warrior.
The leader finally noticed the preoccupation of his band and turned from his task. As the woman moved she ignored his warriors and set path that ended three feet from him. "Who are you?" He asked her in his milk tongue feeling a passionate heat and hunger, lust, build within him in response to her powerful presence though she was not of his kind.
"I am the gatekeeper." She replied in his mother tongue "I've come to keep the path."
On the far side of the barrier not a sound could be heard and if a pin dropped it would be loud in the silence not that any of the women trapped there would respond to the sound. They were like statues each of them staring at the new player on the field. Tara back from her brief trip into nothingness and despair broke the silence with one word, which was quickly swallowed into the ether.
"Willow."
