After breakfast had been eaten and Pat had smoked yet another cigarette, Willow declared that now, it was time for teaching the spell; immediately, the demon nodded, and the redhead moved her chair so she sat opposite to her, telling her to relax as much as possible before she started explaining.
"We've done magic together before, so you know it's important that you keep your calm when you try to do a spell", she began, making the taller woman nod, "that might be hard in case I'm on the ground and bleeding out, but if you're all freaked out, you're much more likely to mess up. Alright?"
"Alright", the black haired woman gave back at once, "I'll give my best to freak out after I managed to heal you, then."
"Yeah, then, you can freak out as much as you want", Willow giggled, then cleared her throat and grew serious again. "The words of the spell are quite simple", she let her partner know, "but the intonation is important, if you do it wrong, it might not work or work not the way it's supposed to. Okay, I'll say it so you know how it's supposed to sound and then you try, alright?"
Nodding, Pat gave her best to catch every small detail about how the spell had to be said when Willow recited it for her; once the witch had fallen silent and gave her an encouraging look, she repeated the spell word for word, not surprised when a few corrections were made by her partner afterwards.
It took several more tries until she got it right, and even then, they both knew that this didn't mean that the spell also would work perfectly in a stressful situation; since Pat had demoned out though the previous evening to heal the arrow wound, they knew it couldn't be tested until the next evening, when they could be sure that the injuries wouldn't open up again.
"I'll put the ingredients you'll need for the spell in a little bag or something, so you can carry them around in your pocket", Willow suggested after the demon had said the spell once more and had gotten it completely right, "then, all you have to do is put them into your palm or something and blow on them as hard as you can after the last word of the spell, then it should already start kicking in."
"Alright, thanks", Pat smiled, the redhead smiling back at her before she got up to find the ingredients and ready them for being taking along to future combats; while she did that, the black haired woman got out her cell phone and dialled the number Jim had written down for her, glad when the call was taken after the second ring and his jovial voice boomed through the speaker, making her grimace as she had forgotten that he sometimes lacked an indoor voice. "Yes, Jim here, who's there?"
"It's me", Pat greeted him, "Pat, and don't shout like that, man, I'm not deaf." In response, he laughed heartily, then apologized, well aware of how this often had ticked the taller woman off when they still had been working and living together.
"I'm happy you're calling", he let her know after the apology, "I did find some markings on that arrow, I wanted to call you and tell you, but then I realized I didn't have your number, and unfortunately, the wind wouldn't tell it to Sue."
"That's too bad", Pat chuckled while Willow moved to sit next to her and started to grind up a bunch of herbs for the spell, listening to what her partner was saying on the phone, "but well, here we are now, talking, so what did you find? Anything useful?"
"In fact, yes", Jim let her know, sounding so absurdly proud that she had to hold back a chuckle, "it's the mark of some sort of demon gang boss from outta town. He and his cronies are in your former line of work though, you know, so I guess someone else gave him the job."
"Well, that should be easier to find out, now that we have at least a tiny lead", the demon gave back, making Willow look up with excitement in her eyes, Pat briefly smiling at her before she focused on Jim again as he laughed once more.
"Indeed, I remember how convincing you can be", he then chuckled, "now we just need to find out where they are hangin' out when they're not out to kill you."
"Leave that to Willow", the demon replied at once, "just bring the arrow here as fast as you can, and she'll do a spell which will show us where they are hiding out."
Next to her, Willow nodded her agreement to that, smiling at her partner again; once more, Pat smiled back, then Jim told her that Sue and he would be there in half an hour, the demon giving her agreement to that before she hung up and beamed at her partner.
"He found some markings on the arrow", she then let her girlfriend know, "belonging to some demon gang boss, group of assassins apparently because Jim said they're in my former line of work. So someone must have hired them to get rid of me, but apparently, they are all amateurs, because I'm still alive."
"Which is good", Willow said at once, giving her partner a strict look, "you should be happy they obviously are not much good at their job."
"Yeah", Pat shrugged, "but back when I was still working, if I'd been sent to kill someone, they'd be dead by now. So it shouldn't be too hard to handle them once we found them… The arrow will help with that, right?"
"It's worth a try to use it for the locator spell", the redhead gave back at once, wondering if she hadn't seen her nod, "if Jim cleaned it properly, that is, if there's too much of your blood still on it, it might react to that and just point out you."
"Then we'll clean it and try again", the demon shrugged, "problem solved. Whew, I'm glad we finally are making some progress, if this works out, I don't need to go around tonight and hope that someone will attack me."
"I better call Buffy", Willow realized as an answer to that, "she should come here too, we might need her help if we'll go out to face those guys immediately."
Nodding, Pat still demanded a kiss before she let her make the call; after they had pulled apart again, the redhead got her own phone and called the Slayer while the demon lit up another cigarette, smirking to herself as she thought of the results the locator spell might bring and how this situation might be resolved sooner than any of them might think right now.
Forty minutes later, Jim, Sue and Buffy had all made themselves comfortable in the living room, drinking coffee Willow had provided for them while the demon was checking the arrow to make sure there wasn't too much blood on it so the spell would end up locating her and the redhead was preparing everything for the spell itself, spreading a map of Sunnydale on the table and readying the ingredients.
"Let's hope they're staying somewhere here in town", she commented while she did so, making the others nod, "I'm not sure what the spell will do if they aren't, we've never had that before."
"From what I know, they put some sort of headquarter in a town when they are sent there", Jim helpfully let her know, beaming at her, making her wonder how he could always be so cheerful – and how the mornings had looked like when Pat had still be living with the group, seeing how grouchy she was in the morning while this man apparently got up and felt good and ready to talk.
Making a mental note to herself to ask him about that when she'd have the chance, the witch got done with preparing everything for the spell by lining up the ingredients; she sat down at the table, then took the arrow from her partner and used a small knife to scrape some of its wood into the bowl she would use for the ingredients, looking at Pat afterwards.
"You know when to give me fire, right?" she wanted to know, smiling when at once, the demon nodded; she moved to sit beside her so aiming at the bowl would be easier, then the room fell quiet as Willow started to mumble the spell, putting the ingredients into the bowl one by one, even Sue paying attention on the process, watching with round eyes, even her mouth slightly agape.
The moment she had said the last word and had thrown the last herb into the bowl, Pat let one hand flame up and made a lazy flicking gesture into the general direction of said bowl; a tiny ball of fire flew from her fingers and landed right in the middle of the ingredients, all of them puffing away into nothingness with an audible foomph, a thick column of white smoke rising to the ceiling moments later.
Holding their breaths, they all watched how the smoke kept curling towards the ceiling for a few more moments, then, defying all laws of physics, moved downwards and spread over the map; and another half a minute later, a small glowing light appeared there, Willow letting out a "Yes!" when she looked at the exact location and saw that it was not the apartment of Pat and her.
"You did it", Pat beamed next to her, pulling her into an embrace with such fierceness that the witch involuntarily let out a little squeal, then laughed, "once again, you did it, that's my girl."
Still laughing, Willow nodded and beamed at her, the others watching with smiles on their faces as well; then, Buffy leaned forward and studied the map, frowning slightly to herself when she saw the location the spell had pointed out.
"That's an office building", she let the others know, looking up at them again, "do you think they rented space there or what?"
"Could be", Jim shrugged, "why don't we go there and find out?"
"Good idea", Pat agreed at once, "and we better take some weapons along, just in case. Easily concealable ones, though…"
"No axe for you, then", Willow stated at once, giggling at the way her girlfriend's face fell; with a sigh, Pat nodded, then got up and asked Buffy to come with her, so they could check out her weapon collection and arm themselves, the Slayer following her gladly enough while Jim and Sue remained where the were, explaining that weapons weren't their strong side when they noticed Willow's curious look at them.
"Plus, we don't really need weapons to fight", the chubby man then added, smiling at her – before he scooted a bit closer to her on the couch, keeping his voice low so Buffy and Pat wouldn't hear him in the adjoining room.
"You know", he started, for once not sounding jolly, but serious, "when we first heard that stories of Pat hooking up with someone and ending up fighting side by side with the Slayer, we really couldn't believe it. But… now that I've seen how she's acting with you… I think you're the best thing that ever could have happened to her."
"Oh", Willow brought out after a few moments of stunned silence, "wow… thanks… I really don't know what to say now."
"You don't need to say anything", Jim reassured her at once, "and we shouldn't talk too long about that anyway, I don't want her to walk in on us talking about that, she'd get all flustered, you know how she is, right? Just wanted to tell you this, now that it's just us."
"Thanks again", the redhead gave back, feeling how hot her cheeks were and knowing that she was blushing, "I have no idea how she was before we got together, so it means a lot to hear that…"
"You brought out her human again", Sue said in a dreamy voice, "I was sad when she left us and I was happy when we came here to see her, but how I'm even happier."
She beamed at the witch, and after a moment, Willow smiled back; then, the door leading to the bedroom opened again and Buffy and Pat came back out, both of them, to the surprise of the others, armed with swords now.
"Didn't you say something about weapons which can be concealed easily?" Jim finally asked, raising an eyebrow when both the Slayer and the demon grinned in reply.
"That's what coats are for", Buffy then explained, "luckily, the weather's cool enough so it won't look strange."
"Not that we're not strange looking enough already", Willow commented with a giggle, and the blonde had to admit that she had a point – after all, a group of four women and one man, three of them with multi-coloured hair and one of the women wearing an eyepatch wasn't an everyday sight.
"You guys all ready to go then?" Buffy asked after both Pat and she had put on their coats and had hidden the weapons beneath them; the others nodded in reply, then the demon remembered that she had nearly forgotten something important and hurried into the kitchen, returning with a small leather pouch in hand moments later.
"The ingredients for the healing spell", she explained at the curious look Buffy was giving her; nodding, the Slayer smiled, and once the taller woman had put the pouch into her pocket, they all left the apartment together, taking the map with them to easier find the location of their foes, all of them hoping that the visit there would bring an end to the current situation.