Chapter 11

Xander, Anya, Willow and Tara all sat quietly around the large table in The Magic Box. No one knew exactly why Giles had called them here, but all were feeling strangely wary. The air in the little store was thick with trepidation. Only two days earlier, a huge fight had broken out amongst the Scoobies. They were no closer to finding Buffy, and they were running out of options.

Willow and Tara had performed location spells over maps of every country in the world, but no light appeared to indicate Buffy's whereabouts. It looked as if she was no longer in this world. Giles had thought it was possible that if she had been kidnapped, her abductor could have used some sort of magic to cloak her, thereby diffusing any kind of locator spell. They had spent hours researching this idea; Willow had come up with a general counter-cloaking spell, but since they had no idea which direction to cast it in, it was pointless to try.

Willow and Tara had skipped a week's worth of classes since they were busy taking care of Dawn, as well as searching for Buffy. The teenager had been surprisingly calm and silent throughout this ordeal, as if she knew something no one else did, but of course, she didn't. Spike stayed with her when he wasn't patrolling at night, and she went to school during the day as if nothing in particular was wrong. The gang surmised that after everything Dawn had been through, she was now in shock and denial. She wasn't acting overtly happy, just blithely neutral, and everyone found it unnerving, but no one knew what to do about it.

Xander had barely slept in the last week and was in danger of losing his job, since he'd taken an indefinite "sick leave" in order to devote every hour to finding his missing friend. This was also a problem for Anya, who constantly reminded Xander that losing his job meant not having money, which, in turn meant no wedding. They still hadn't announced their engagement, something Anya thought would cheer everyone up, but Xander kept telling her to wait. Between Anya's grievances and his worry over Buffy, Xander thought he was soon going to split at the seams.

Anya, for her part, was sulking, but not just because of her dissatisfaction with her man. Buffy had been missing for over a week, and when the gang seemed to come to the conclusion that Buffy was no longer in this dimension, Anya came up with what she had thought was a very insightful theory. Unfortunately, her suggestion caused much strife and was the impetus for the aforementioned fight among the tight-knit, and tightly wound group.

"Hell probably took her back," Anya had stated, as if it should be plain as day to everyone.

Willow and Tara stared at her from their position on the Summers' couch, horrified. "Why? Why would you say something like that? That's horrible, even for you!" The redhead's face flushed in anger, and her eyes seemed to emit red sparks.

"Ahn-" Xander started, but was interrupted by the indignant ex-demon.

"What?" Anya shouted in confusion. "What is so awful about my theory? It makes perfect sense. No one ever likes my theories," she pouted and looked around the room at the appalled faces staring at her.

Anya spoke to Willow as one would speak to a five-year old when explaining the facts of life. "We took Buffy out of hell, and hell got mad and took her back." A growl sounded from the staircase, and everyone turned to see Spike descending after seeing Dawn off to bed.

"Don't talk like that, the Bit will hear you," he grumbled.

"It's completely possible!" Anya exclaimed, ignoring the vampire. "Demons don't like it when the souls they're torturing are stolen from their realms, they get really cranky."

"I guess you'd know," Willow spat contemptuously.

"I-it's possible, sweetie," Tara said, attempting to placate both parties, and placed a comforting hand on her girlfriend's tense shoulder. "After all, we did defy the forces of nature in order to bring her back. M-maybe it wasn't meant to last."

"Nature?" Willow exclaimed, incredulous. "How can you call the way she died natural? She jumped into a portal and her soul was sucked into hell-" The witch's tirade was cut off by yet another growl from Spike who looked as if he were ready to explode.

"And having her wake up, shut in her coffin, six feet under ground, was that natural?" he ground out between clenched teeth. Giles, who had been standing in quiet contemplation by the fireplace this whole time jumped at the vampire's accusatory tone.

"That was a mistake," Xander interjected. "We didn't think that far ahead-"

"What, did you think she was just going to appear, 'poof' and that'd be it?" Spike's voice dripped with derision. "Do you sods have any idea what that did to her?"

"And what did being in hell do to her?" Xander shot back angrily. "Maybe we did something stupid by not digging her up, but it's a hell of a lot better than leaving her where she was!"

At this, Spike let loose a loud yell of rage, no longer caring if he woke up Dawn, let alone the whole neighborhood. Everyone drew back at this display of anger; even though they knew he couldn't harm them, he was still intimidating in this state. He grabbed a small statue off the end table, and hurled it across the room. The wooden sculpture hit the wall next to Giles' head and shattered into several pieces.

"You lot don't know a fucking thing!" he shouted, pointing at the stunned group, and he stormed out of the living room and out the front door.

No one said anything for a few moments; each member of the group sat, confused by Spike's impassioned behavior and words. At last, Tara moved to go upstairs when she heard Dawn's voice calling down, asking what was wrong. The four people left in the room looked at each other silently, until Xander spoke at last.

"Well, I never thought I'd say it," he said with a mirthless chuckle. "But Spike's right, we don't know a fucking thing."

But Spike does, Giles thought to himself, and he strode purposefully to the front door to go after the vampire, if he could catch him. He was out the door before anyone could question him, and hours later, when he came back, he would not speak to or look at anyone, and he avoided Willow especially.

The next day, he packed his case and checked into a nearby Bed and Breakfast, adding to the friends' confusion. Now, they sat waiting for him to emerge from his office in The Magic Box, after not hearing from him for two whole days.

Giles stood poised to enter the room, unsure of how to go about telling these four exactly what they'd done. On one hand, he felt a sort of grim satisfaction in proving to Willow how arrogant she'd been, but on the other, he knew they'd all be completely devastated.

When he'd finally caught up with Spike at his crypt the other night, it had taken some doing to get the vampire to speak to him, let alone allow him inside his domain. Giles had stood in the doorway awkwardly for a moment until Spike finally told him to make up his mind whether to stay or go. Giles, feeling rather stupid for being so reticent with the vampire, stepped in and shut the door behind him.

Spike sat sullenly on his beat-up couch after having answered the door. He was clutching a bottle of Scotch that looked oddly familiar to the former librarian, but Giles decided not to press the issue.

"Something you want, Rupes?" Spike drawled, and then took a swig from the bottle. "I don't suppose you just came over for a drink, did you?"

Giles stood in the middle of the room, his hands stuffed in his pockets. "Er, no Spike, I didn't," he replied, and moved to join the vampire on the couch. "May I?"

Spike barely glanced at his guest. "Suit yourself. Wanna sip?" he held out the bottle to Giles as he made himself comfortable.

"No, but thank you for offering me my own Scotch, it's very kind of you," Giles replied dryly.

Spike frowned, and looked at the bottle. "Oh, right. Thought you were selling this at your store," he offered as an explanation.

"Did you?" Giles raised an eyebrow. "Anya would charge for a button someone found on the floor, I'm sure. Where was it, exactly and how much did you pay for it?"

"Didn't pay for it," Spike mumbled, standing to walk over to a column and lean against it. "Nicked it from the cabinet in your office."

"The cabinet in my office that's always locked?" Giles looked up at him, his expression unreadable.

"'S right," Spike answered defensively. "Had a little trouble with a demon that night, thought I deserved somethin' special to relax with."

"I see," Giles felt it was time to change the subject, and he leaned forward with his elbows propped on his legs. "I got the feeling back at the house that there's something you're not telling us."

"Did you?" Spike answered, moving away from the column, and taking a drink. He strolled casually over to the small window cut into the stone on the wall.

"Yes, and I think it would be wise, if you do know something that you share it with me at least. It could help us to find Buffy. We needn't tell the others, but if Buffy is in danger anything you can tell me may help us find her."

"And how would I know anything?" Spike spat venomously. "No one keeps me in the loop around here." He began to pace, taking gulps of the amber liquid in between rants. "Old Spike's good enough when you need someone to go patrolling or to watch after the Bit, but don't tell him what's going on-"

Giles stood, and blocked the angry vampire's path. "Spike, please. Part of me doesn't want to believe it, but Anya's theory seems to make sense. We don't know where she was, and if she has been put back there somehow, she may be suffering unspeakable torment." Giles struggled to keep his composure, but the thought of the girl he'd come to love as a daughter enduring hell's agonies pained him immensely.

"Doubt that," Spike muttered under his breath, and Giles just barely caught it.

"What's that?" He took a step closer, but Spike moved away. "Spike, perhaps we don't tell you things, but- well I'm not going to offer any excuses for it, but that's beside the point. I know Buffy's been spending a lot of time with you since she returned."

At that, Spike's head shot up, his face full of confusion. "What? How do you-" he stopped himself, and dropped the question. "Doesn't matter. Yeah, she sought me out, so what?"

"So, I think she's confided in you," Giles told him with absolute certainty. "The way you reacted to everyone back there, well, it's obvious that she's kept information from us, but told it to you."

Spike smirked and looked at Buffy's Watcher, whose brow was knitted in frustration. "Jealous?" This garnered no reaction from Giles, and he dropped the snarky attitude. "I'm surprised you think she'd trust me."

"Did she?"

Spike sighed, and sat down on his haunches, the fingers of his free hand tracing patterns on the dusty floor. It seemed like hours passed before he responded. "Yeah."

"And? What did she tell you?"

"She said they could never know," Spike said, evading the question.

"Who, Willow, Xander, Tara and Anya?" Giles inquired, and Spike nodded. "They can never know." Giles repeated the phrase, cogitating on what that meant.

"O' course, I'd love for them to know," Spike murmured, his eyes following the movements of his hand. "Love to see their faces, I would."

Giles didn't reply, he just waited for Spike to continue. "When she told me, I felt so stupid for thinkin' she'd ever be sent to hell. I never even give much thought to the other place, being what I am..."

"What are you saying, Spike?" Giles breathed, a wonderful but horrifying thought beginning to grow in his mind.

Spike turned his head to look at the man. His eyes were wide behind his glasses, and he'd knelt down next to him, looking him full in the face.

"What do you mean?" Giles whispered, afraid to hear the answer.

"I mean," Spike replied steadily, his gaze never wavering. "I mean that she was never in hell to begin with."

Full realization dawned over Rupert Giles, and he almost collapsed in his shock and grief. He lifted a trembling hand to his glasses and removed them. Covering his eyes with his other hand, he staved off the tears that threatened to fall.

"She was- was she...?" he stammered.

Spike looked back down at the floor before he replied. "Yeah. She was."

Walking in a daze back to the house, he later told himself it was a miracle that he made it back without being attacked by some marauding demon. He surmised that he could have walked through a battlefield during a war, and not have noticed his surroundings. He was too stunned, too stupefied over his own blindness as to why Buffy had been so unhappy.

His girl had been at peace...happy...safe. It made perfect sense. Not just because of her melancholy, but because she deserved that. She had sacrificed so much, saved the world so many times, and her wonderful, loving soul had gone to its reward. And it was cruelly taken from her, he thought, his expression darkening, by her own friends.

The anger slowly built within him, but he was still too flummoxed to know what to do with it, let alone the information he had just been given. Giles didn't know what to say to the Scoobies, so when he walked in the door, he didn't say anything. Xander and Anya had left, mercifully, and Tara was upstairs with Dawn. Willow sat on the staircase, presumably waiting for him to come back.

She looked at him, questions on her face and lips, but he couldn't look at her without exploding. Giles waved his hand at her dismissively, and headed for the basement. He recalled seeing an old cot down there once, when he'd helped Joyce move some things after her surgery last year. He decided he needed to think about what to do, and he needed to be alone.

Once he was settled on the diminutive bed, he knew he wouldn't sleep this night. Giles mulled over and over the entire situation all night, and came to the conclusion that he needed some sort of proof. He somehow knew that Spike hadn't been lying, but he couldn't go solely on the word of a vampire, however helpful he'd been in the past.

In order to find out what had happened to Buffy, he needed concrete confirmation that she hadn't been in hell. Now, he was staring at the proof as he held it in his hand, about to confront the four wary, but unsuspecting idiots in the next room with it.

Coming to a decision at last, he opened the door, and four sets of questioning eyes turned to him. Giles held out the scroll and the document on top of it to a surprised Willow, who took it tentatively, and glanced at it before looking back up at him, her brow furrowed.

"What's this? What does it mean?" Willow asked nervously at the look in her former mentor's eyes.

"It means that you are indeed very powerful, Willow," Giles replied, his voice hard and his gaze piercing. "You must be very proud. Congratulations on tearing Buffy out of the very arms of heaven." Giles watched her face contort into an expression of abject shock, then he strode coldly from the store, very much needing a drink.

For several long minutes following Giles' departure after dropping his bomb, no one moved, save Willow, who let the missive she'd been handed fall to the floor. Tara quickly retrieved it, and read it silently. Xander and Anya watched as her eyes filled with tears, and her free hand came up to her mouth to stifle a sob.

"Oh, Goddess," she breathed and looked sorrowfully over at Willow, not knowing what to say. The redheaded witch, who still hadn't read the document was staring into space, frowning as if she was trying to grasp a memory niggling in the back of her mind. Tara placed the scroll on the table, and went to her lover, attempting to rouse her from her stupor, but didn't succeed. Xander reached for the paper, determined to understand just what was on it that made Tara so upset.

Anya got up, pushing her chair back from the table with her legs, and walked softly over to the door of the shop. Sighing, she flipped the sign in the door heralding "Come in, we're open!" to the side which bore the sad message, "Sorry, we're closed", and turned the lock in the door. It had been a slow day in any case, and she suddenly found herself in a rare mood. The gloomy atmosphere made the prospect of paying customers taste sour, and she was drained of her usual manic energy. What Giles had said made perfect sense, even more so than her original theory. The former vengeance demon had never had anything to do with the higher dimensions in her long life, but she knew of their existence. If Buffy had truly been in one of them, that would explain a lot.

Xander's tired, red-rimmed eyes scanned the document over and over, comprehension still evading him after the initial shock. His vision blurred, and the words seemed to swim on the page.

Rupert,

If you had rung me this time last year, wanting to know if there was a way to determine the whereabouts of your Slayer following her demise, I would have told you it wasn't possible. The mysteries of the universe are vast and incomprehensible, as I'm sure you're aware, and who is to say where a soul goes when it departs from its body?

However, since Ms. Summers has returned from death a second time (another former impossibility) you tell me that she has confided to you that she was in a peaceful place that she thought could have been 'heaven'.

While I do not profess to know about what lies beyond the veil, I now know that a discovery has been made as to what Slayers are due once they die. A few months ago, I was called to Bavaria, Germany to the site of an archaeological excavation of the ruins of a 16th century monastery. The workers had come across some preserved writings in Ancient Latin and German, for which I am known outside the Watchers Council for specializing in translating.

Gunther Bergen, a dear friend of mine who was in charge of the excavation, asked me to come and take a look at what they'd found. Aside from a few journals and some half-finished sermons, one scroll in particular caught my attention. It had been encased in a leather roll, and was hidden away in a wall behind the altar of the church inside the seminary. Its title read (in German) "Die Belohnung des Heiligen Kriegers" or "The Holy Warrior's Reward".

Thinking this could have applied to any knight who served in the name of Christ and the Church, I scanned it casually until a phrase caught my eye: "She who battles the darkest evil in the world shall find peace at last in the Kingdom to come." Naturally, the fact that a woman was mentioned sparked my interest, and I set about researching this document thoroughly.

After months of investigation, I traced the scroll as being a translation from a Latin text written by an order of monks who tended to a Slayer in the 12th century in Germany.

The account was recorded in a journal which had turned up in a library in Cologne and it spoke of the incident in detail. She had been found mortally wounded in a field nearby their abode after a battle with a vampire who had been plaguing the area. The beast was vanquished, but not before it slashed her throat. She had mustered the will to plunge a stake into its heart, and the monster turned to dust.

Those monks who had witnessed some of the battle carried her inside the seminary, grateful for her sacrifice. This nameless girl had given her life to save them from a horrible death.

As she lay dying, peacefulness overcame her being, and she spoke of happiness unlike any other. The Slayer passed, her face content and beatific. This account was written by the head of the order, who then spent several days in prayer for her soul. During his meditation, he was granted a vision by God who told him that His Chosen warrior and all others who followed in her footsteps would be rewarded with "dauerhafter Friede" (everlasting peace) and would be forever at rest.

Thus, "The Slayers Reward" was written and sanctified by the monks, who, for reasons unknown to me kept their discovery to themselves. Perhaps if they knew about the Watchers Council, they felt the knowledge would be used to manipulate rather than console.

It is for the purposes of consolation that I turn this scroll over to you, along with the English translation, since I'm not sure if you've kept up with your German. I find that if the monks had indeed found the Watchers Council unworthy of this information, that I must agree with them. They would undoubtedly hold this above the head of any Slayer to force obedience to their decrees and orders, and I could not abide that.

The Council has become a thorn in my side, but I won't bore you by elaborating on that. I only tell you that because I find I can no longer stomach some of their more arcane methods, which is why I will not turn the scroll over to them. Keep this scroll and preserve it, my friend. It may provide much needed comfort to future Watchers and those Slayers yet-to-be will leave behind.

Yours sincerely,

Archie Crawford

Two small wet spots marred the cream-colored paper, and caused the ink to run. Xander Harris watched the moisture spread as his tears were absorbed, and cursed himself silently.