Chapter 3 -- Another Earthquake

"Bye, guys!" Willow called cheerfully after Dawn and Buffy as they rushed from the house on their way to school.

Willow plugged a Clannad CD into the radio and turned up the speakers before she began straightening the kitchen and living room. Singing along in Gaelic, she pulled down a teacup and a tin of loose tea, chamomile mostly with a bit of lavender and rosemary. The soothing blend was one that Giles had hooked her on in England. It was not just that the tea itself was calming, either. Willow had dozens of fond memories of just sitting with Giles, sharing tea and feelings. Sometimes he had been the one to talk and sometimes she had, but it did not matter who did the talking, or even if they were completely silent. Those moments had been islands of calm for both of them in an otherwise chaotic existence.

Willow had come to hold such moments of peace very dear indeed, and she never passed up an opportunity to make one for herself. As the water boiled, she sat down and closed her eyes, taking several deep breaths and summoning up the most soothing mental images she could. Giles had taught her the simple meditation, along with a score of variants, when the pain over Tara's death and her subsequent actions had simply been too much for her to bear. Willow had discovered since returning to Sunnydale that it was equally well-adapted to clearing one's mind at the beginning of the day.

She tried to keep her mind clear as she always did during these meditations, but her thoughts kept drifting back to Giles. Shaking her head, she took a deep breath and started over without much better results. Instead of Giles, though, it was Cassandra Evans whose image made its way into her awareness this time. Cassandra Evans, her black hair making her pale face seem even more pale, her enormous ice-colored eyes looking at Willow and then through her and into the future.

Willow was almost grateful when the whistling of the kettle interrupted her meditations. It went without saying that, having failed two attempts to center herself, it was going to be a pretty chaotic day. She was not looking forward to it in the least. She poured hot water over the tea and left it to steep for a few minutes, walking upstairs to her room and finding a white candle.

"Time to bring out the big guns," she announced to no one in particular, picking it up and carrying it back downstairs.

Yet another technique Giles had shown her, she reflected, lighting the candle and extinguishing the lights in the living room. She set the candle on the coffee-table and quickly retrieved her tea. Placing the cup on the edge of the table, she sat down on the floor, crossing her legs. She moved the candle on the table until it was less than six inches from her nose, inhaling deeply, and focusing on the flame.

On a beginner's level, the object was to keep the flame from flickering which, of course, meant controlling your breathing quite strictly. That accomplished, one could begin to experiment with advanced techniques, changing the color or shape of the flame for instance, or making it move in certain ways. Giles had spent hours with her over these sorts of exercises in self-control. He had been good at them himself, of course, owing to years of practice and could produce blue or green flame without any effort at all, and could make the flame behave in ways that a flame had absolutely no business behaving in.

Willow stared thoughtfully at the flame, her hands resting lightly on her knees, and made it dance in time with the music that was still playing on the radio. This particular track was slow and airy, perfect for this sort of meditation, and the flame seemed almost to enjoy dancing along. Willow smiled as the flame flattened and began spiraling upwards like a length of ribbon being twirled through the air. Deciding that orange was boring, she turned it black instead, nodding to herself and picking up her teacup.

She sipped at her tea as she watched the flame dance, pleased that she was starting to be able to unwind. She would be able to try the meditations again soon with more success, she knew. As a faster, more upbeat track came on, she put the teacup down on the edge of the coffee-table and levitated the flame a few inches off of the wick of the candle. Smiling to herself, she altered its shape until it took on the outline of a ballet dancer.

"Now all you need is something to dance to," Willow said quietly to the dancer-shaped flame.

A mental nudge made the CD player select the opening theme from Harry's Game as the next track it played. When the ethereal tones began, Willow set the flame dancing again. It took so much concentration to make the flame maintain its shape that she did not notice that the ground was shaking until the teacup perched on the edge of the table clattered off and into her lap.

"Ow!" she yelped, waving her hand defensively and sending the cup tumbling from her lap to the floor.

The flame vanished with an audible 'pop' as the teacup hit the floor, upside down. Shaking her head, Willow blew on her burnt hand until the tremor subsided. It was not particularly powerful as earthquakes went: not a single picture had fallen from the wall. In fact, the only damage seemed to be to her hand, and that was minor. Well, that and the stain on the carpet. Fortunately, Willow knew how to get chamomile out of upholstery. Shaking her head, she picked up the cup. And nearly dropped it again as she stared at the little puddle of tea-leaves on the carpet.

"Okay, that's… not good," she muttered to herself. She did not know a lot about reading tea-leaves, just a handful of the basics from Cassandra, but she knew enough to know that the patterns that hers had made on the carpet were just plain bad news. "Great, that's all we need," she whispered, wondering if she should call Buffy immediately or wait until after Buffy had finished work to tell her.

She looked again, decided that the doom and gloom being foretold by the tea-leaves was not immediately threatening, and decided to wait until after class. She would do some research before she bothered Buffy, she decided, get some facts. Well, she had known that it was not going to be a fun day, she told herself, rising. She ran her scalded hand under cold water for a few moments, then returned to the living room to clean up the mess on the carpet.

***

Since she had a few minutes between Philosophy and Anthropology, Willow stopped by the library to check her email. Lots of junk, a few articles that had been posted to the Anthropology Club's list-serve, and a reply from Giles. Smiling, she quickly opened it, ignoring the urge to magically hasten the process when the computer lagged for a few moments. Her smile widened as she read the message over. It was long and chatty and full of news about Giles himself, the estate, his horses, and various members of the Coven.

She shook her head at the news that his flower garden was displaying some very unusual behaviors. Clearly, he thought that the new flowers had been her idea of a joke, or just a nice way to say hello. It amused him and he agreed that it was cheaper than calling a florist, but had it not taken a lot of energy? Willow was a bit confused, though. The Costa Rican flora had not been her doing, and she doubted that there were many members of the Coven who could easily have pulled such a trick off. Connected or not, Costa Rica was a long way from rural England. So where had the flowers come from?

She shrugged that off and printed the message out to read over later. Somehow, receiving email from Giles was like getting a letter from home. She was about to log off when the page refreshed itself and a new message popped up. Her smile wavered slightly as she read the sender's address. The .uk extension on the address set off warning bells in her mind. The only people she knew in the UK were Giles and the Coven, and since it was not from 'Buffys_watcher_2', it had to have been from a member of the Coven.

She glanced around nervously and considered deleting the message. For no good reason she could name, it was making her as nervous as hell. No subject line, either. Typical. She hesitated, reading the address again. 'Brit_Delphian'. Cassandra, of course. Willow was not sure if she should feel relieved or not. Cassandra had always been very nice to her, not as scared as the others, but she also knew things… And those things were seldom nice.

Willow shook off her sense of disquiet and opened the email.

You read much poetry, Will? Better brush up on your Yeats. Second Coming, you know the poem? Maybe you should give it a looking over. Give my love to Rupert…

She blinked in surprise and reread the message. Typical of Cassandra. Short and cryptic. Poetry? She shook her head. The name sounded familiar, but she could not quite place the poem itself. Shaking her head, she opened a new browser and called up a search-engine. Frowning, she looked at the message yet again.

"Give my love to Giles?" she whispered.

Was that supposed to mean that he coming back to Sunnydale? It would have been wonderful to have him back. She had missed his support and friendship so much in just the few months since she had gotten home. But… why would he come back? In England, he had explained to her why he had left in the first place, how he felt he was holding Buffy back and it was time for her to stand on her own two feet, but Willow had never entirely bought it. There was more going on than what Giles had been willing to confess, even to himself. It had hovered on the fringes of his consciousness, flanked by the twin sentinels of guilt and fear, every time Buffy's name came up.

He had always loved Buffy like a daughter, he had told Willow, and she had known that he was lying to her and himself, because guilt and fear had closed ranks and that hovering something had retreated more deeply into the shadows of his psyche. She had seen it and felt it and had known that it was not the whole story, not even most of the story. But a person's mind was their own, and whether you could see into it or not, it was impolite to intrude there. So she had looked at him and said 'sure, Giles', knowing it was a lie but respecting her friend enough not to point it out to him.

There had been a flicker of something in his expression then that had indicated that maybe Giles had known it was a lie after all, and that had surprised Willow more. He was certainly an insightful man, and knew himself better than most people would ever know about themselves. But the impression Willow got was that, whatever he was hiding, he was hiding it from himself most of all. Giles, a man who resolutely faced his own demons on almost every count, was scared of this one. Willow had wondered then, still wondered occasionally. What could there possibly be in his relationship with Buffy to cause that kind of pain? Or guilt?

"Willow, you going to sit there daydreaming all afternoon? Or are you going to grace us with your presence?" a cheerful voice asked.

She looked up at Professor Tierney, one of her Anthropology professors, who was walking past with an armload of papers. "Oh, sorry, James," she said, logging off. "Just checking my email." She rose and they started out of the library together.

"Always get that dreamy-eyed about poetry recommendations?" he teased with a good-natured grin.

Willow smiled and shook her head. Had she actually looked dreamy-eyed while thinking about Giles? That was just silly. Well, okay, so maybe occasionally the old high-school crush did reassert itself… This time, though, she had just been thoughtful, trying to puzzle out several things at once. Just as well that James had mistaken the look for something else entirely. Would have made for an interesting conversation otherwise.

'Hey, Willow. You look worried. What's up?'

'Oh, you know, James. The usual. Cryptic emails from a modern-day priestess to Apollo. Prophecies of doom disguised as poetry recommendations. A friend who's in love with my best friend but refuses to admit it, even to himself. Costa Rican irises sprouting spontaneously in a British rose-garden. Oh and, by the way, you know that earthquake we had this morning? Well, it broke my teacup, and the way the tea leaves fell as a result tells me that all hell is about to break lose. Literally. Like I said, the usual. So, is there a quiz today?'

She smiled and shook her head. "It was the email before that. Friend in England I haven't seen in awhile."

James nodded. "Ah. You have many friends in England?"

"A few." She shrugged uncomfortably. "I… spent a few months over there kind of recently."

"Ah, cool. I did an excavation there once. Nice country. Except for all the rain…"

Willow laughed and nodded. "It does rain a lot, yeah."

"So, who in England does Miss Rosenburg get all dreamy-eyed over? She must be something else."

Willow chuckled softly. "He, actually," she corrected, shaking her head. "It's not like that, though. He was a very good friend through some very bad times."

He nodded understandingly, holding the door for her as they approached the Anthropology building. "Important to have friends like that. It's good that you stay in touch."

"Thanks." She nodded. "Yeah. Don't know where I'd be right now without him." She hoped her smile did not look as pained as it felt.

He patted her shoulder gently. "This was after Tara died?"

She nodded. James knew the whole story. Almost. "Yeah. Things were… rough, you know?"

"I can imagine, yeah." He gave her shoulder a little squeeze.

Willow was glad when they reached the classroom and several other students converged on James with questions, allowing her to slip to her seat unnoticed. By the time class was over two hours later, she had managed to completely forget Cassandra's email, had even managed to forget the tea-leaves, although her sense of disquiet remained, a constant, nagging presence.

"Hey, Will, you feel that earthquake this morning?" the girl sitting next to her asked as they started packing their books away.

"Yeah, Maya." Willow nodded, her sense of disquiet growing. "Couldn't have been more than a 2 or a 3, though," she pointed out, as much to comfort herself as anything.

"Yeah, probably not." She shrugged. "Hate them, though. Not my favorite way to start a day."

Willow nodded in agreement, zipping her bag and rising. "Tell me about it."

"Hey, were you clear on that whole distinction James was making? Sanctioned magic versus the illegal kind in aboriginal society? I was kind of iffy on it."

"You should have asked," Willow pointed out, shaking her head.

"I know. I just get shy."

Willow smiled and nodded her understanding. "Okay. I was just on my way to the cafeteria. If you want to join me, I can run through it with you."

"The cafeteria? How can anyone eat that junk? It's only food in the loosest possible sense of the term." Maya made a face. "Why don't we go get pizza instead? I'll drive."

Willow grinned and nodded. "Okay. Let's go."

***

"Make sense?" Willow asked as she concluded her explanation. She grabbed another piece of pizza and looked curiously at Maya.

Maya nodded and poured herself another soda from the pitcher between them. "Think so, yeah. Was that all from James' lecture, though? A lot of it seemed new."

Willow shook her head. "Oh, a lot of it is stuff I picked up in other classes or from friends over the years. I thought it might help, though."

"Oh, it did." Maya nodded and helped herself to a breadstick. "How'd you get to be such an authority on magic anyway?"

"Oh, I had this teacher… friend," Willow amended, smiling and shaking her head. Her smile faded. Give my love to Rupert… Cassandra's message had said. She shook herself, aware that Maya was watching her attentively, waiting for her to finish her story. "I met him when I was in high-school. He got me into it in the first place. I've learned a lot from him over the years." She shrugged and shook her head. "He's… taught me a lot."

"You okay?" Maya asked quietly.

Willow nodded. "Yeah. Just wondering what he's up to these days. He moved back to England a while ago."

"Bummer. Always sucks when friends move away."

"Yeah." Willow nodded. "It does. Not that he's not still there for us when we need him." She smiled and shook her head. "He has this habit of turning up when needed." Is he needed now? a voice in the back of her head demanded. Is that why Cassandra said he was coming? Does he know something? About the tea-leaves?

Willow's reflections were interrupted abruptly as another tremor hit. Glasses, plates, and silverware rattled on the table as Willow and Maya dove beneath it.

"I hate Cali!" Maya groaned.

Willow patted her arm reassuringly and waited for it to pass. "Okay, let's get outside," she sighed, climbing out from under the table. That's all I need. A rumbly Hell-mouth…

***

Alone in the house, Willow locked herself into her room, extinguished the lights, and pulled out her tarot deck. She was very sure that she did not want to know what the cards had to say, but she was equally sure that she had to know. The cards felt hot in her hands as she shuffled them, reciting a prayer to Apollo that Cassandra had taught her. Ignoring her growing sense of disquiet, she began laying the cards out.

The Tower. The Chariot, reversed. The Wheel of Fortune, reversed. The Moon. Death, reversed. The Devil. The Hierophant.

"Giles?" she whispered, staring at the card. It was the only half-way favorable card in the spread, and one that she had always, in her mind, associated with Giles. She frowned, wondering at the odds of a spread consisting of nothing but members of the major arcana.

Shaking her head, she turned over another card. Strength, the card Giles said he had always associated with her. Another, Justice, Buffy's card. One more, she told herself. The Knight of Swords, Xander.

Willow shook her head and gathered the cards together. She had seen enough. Giles would arrive soon. He would know how to proceed. Buffy and Xander would have to be told in the meantime, she supposed. But should she tell them now or wait until tonight?

She decided to wait. In the meantime, she would do a bit of research and see what she could find out about what was coming. She would start, as Cassandra had suggested. By brushing up on her Yeats.