World's Edge
Part One: The Host
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The burns were healing nicely. Spike sat in the shadows for days, growing glassy eyed and hungry, feeling his body knit itself back together. It was better to feel the bones grind and pop themselves into place than think about what he had done. The chip was in his head, the demon was in his bones, and the soul sat like pewter in his gut, heavy and dull.
Something scuffled in the sand to his left, the toe of a sneaker against the dirty cave floor. Spike shifted his eyes towards the sound.
"You're all sparkly," Tara said with a shy smile.
His mind, exhausted, did not question her presence. Tara in Africa, why not? Perhaps Buffy and her sundry sharp wooden objects were just around the corner. Sniffed him out looking for revenge. Xander Harris with his big axe at the ready.
"Glad you approve," Spike frowned. He supposed she meant the sodding soul.
Personally he was starting to think he had been better off without it. Cold as the moon, the soul shone a hard, pale light through his thoughts, harshly illuminating all his missteps and misconceptions. Before the plan had been clear: get the soul and then scurry back to Sunnydale. What would he have told the Slayer? Hello, doll, just thought I'd pop by and show you my shiny new soul. Had he really thought that? All better. No more evil. Start again. The simplicity was beautiful.
"I'm an idiot," he said with despair. Spike looked out into the sun that trapped him in the lurky demon's cave. One step into the daylight and he could end the whole stupid thing now. He rolled his head against the gritty cave wall towards Tara.
"I - I think you made the right choice," she nodded, hiding behind her hair.
Why did she bob her head like that, Spike wondered. It annoyed the fuck out of him. He should have wished the chip out. At least then he could have fed on her. He was hungry, and it would be nice to have something fresh and warm for a change. His stomach twisted. No, not on her, because she was kind, and she spoke more sense than the rest of that lot. How had they managed to survive for so long?
"Do you now?" asked Spike. "What do you know about my choices?"
Did she know about the bathroom? Had Buffy told everyone? He felt sick. Unsteadily he stood up and walked toward the witch, his hand against the wall to stabilize himself. Something was wrong.
"So...umn. are you Spike still, or William?" Tara shifted from foot to foot nervously.
"Still Spike. Just with a new type of headache, love." Bloody hell, she wasn't breathing. And she wasn't warm. He tilted his head with something approaching kindness. "What happened to you then?"
Tara smiled. Stupid girl smiled at everything. She smiled and lifted her curtain of hair and showed him her chest. Around the bullet hole the blood was glistening, but didn't smell like anything. It was an illusion, a way for her to tell the story without using any words.
Tara was disappointed by his reaction. Spike didn't look at all surprised, simply more dead than usual. Bits of light and bits of shadow standing in front of her looking bored and tired and, if she squinted, sparkly and clean in a way she would never have been able to see when she was alive. How like him to make such a futile romantic gesture. Better, Tara thought, than trying to destroy the world because you lost your lover, but still pretty pointless. He would begin to realize that soon enough, and she wanted to talk to him before the full implications settled in. What would he do when he realized he could never have Buffy now? Fall on a stake? That would typical of him.
"I'm sorry," Spike said, and to his surprise he was. Didn't take him too long to become a soft fuck, did it? "But I have enough dead people to haunt me, thanks all the same."
"I want you to do something for me," Tara said. "Please," she added, remembering her manners.
Spike shook his head. He didn't even want to hear the offer. Ghosts. Why can't some people just leave the living world alone? Then he laughed sharply. Tara stood patiently by.
"What's in it for me?" he asked finally, because with all the restrictions put on him by the demon, the chip and the soul, none of them prevented him from being selfish.
"I'll give you a present," Tara offered as though she was trying to bribe a child.
Spike paused, looking out into the sunlight, weighing his options. "I'm not going back to Sunnydale." He gave the caveat with something that resembled fear.
"No," Tara agreed. "You're not. Now hold still; this will hurt."
She reached out her cold hand to his chest and Spike screamed again. He wondered if this was what penitence was like.
______________________________________________________________________
London had not changed much since the last time he had been there. It was still dark and sooty. The road was slick from the polluted rain falling from the familiar dusky sky. No direct sunlight this evening. No more horseshit in the street either, sticking to his boots, or catching in his cloak, which was defiantly an improvement. Spike paused before a red Georgian door with no handle. He could just break through the deadbolt, but that wouldn't get him far so he knocked three times, politely. Carefully Spike listened to the sound of papers being shuffled aside, footsteps moving towards the entrance. There was a pause while his prey stood behind the door, peering through the peak-hole. No surprises then. Even so the door still opened.
"Hello, Watcher. Aren't you going to invite me in?" Spike asked with a sharp, cold grin.
Giles loomed in the doorway, hard, and weary, and unimpressed by this bit of bravado. Spike surmised the Watcher had spoken to Buffy and expected him to reach for a stake like a good father figure. He also felt an unexpected rush of compassion for Giles who longed to protect Buffy and all the Scoobies and was hopelessly under qualified. Nobody could protect Buffy better than she could protect herself. Spike stomped the feeling down someplace low and out of the way. Was this what the soul was going to do? Annoy his un-life with sorrow for the dead and pity for poncy Watchers? He had expected something more dramatic and.interesting.
"The chip's still in," he said, pointing two fingers at his forehead in what he hoped was a reassuring manner.
Standing in the door, Giles ran both hands through his graying hair and said nothing. Words, words to deal with Spike, didn't come to his mouth fast enough. There weren't enough words in the world.
Mentally he enumerated why he didn't have time for this. One, he had research to do regarding a rather annoying prophecy that would, with his luck, foretell of imminent danger and possibly death. Two, something would have to be done with Willow soon. The Devon Coven had almost finished preparing for the binding ritual, but she was giving them a most frightful time in the meanwhile. Three, there was an Edicitnafni demon eating children in Clapham, and he doubted anybody else was going to deal with it. All things considered, he really did not have time for Spike now. Or ever. But why would Spike be here at all? Loathing his own curiosity, Giles sighed and stepped aside.
"Very well. You may come in, Spike," Giles said, ushering the vampire through the door. "Although I don't guarantee I will allow you to leave."
"Yeah? Well, fair enough."
As Spike entered the living room his nose filled with the scent of dust, paper, and cracked leather bindings: the smells he had come to associate with Giles over the years. With a twinge of self-preservation, his eyes roamed the room searching for anything sharp and wooden. All he found was a tiny room crammed with ancient volumes shelved and stacked in no discernable order, a couch, two wing backed chairs, a table obscured by reams of paper, and a teapot covered in a tea-cozy. Of course Giles owned a tea-cozy. The man gave Brits the world over a bad name.
They sat down in the chairs by the fireplace like two gentleman preparing for a long, civil discussion about cigars or horse racing. Having removed the tea-cozy, Giles poured himself a fresh cup. Pointedly, he did not offer any to the vampire.
"Suppose you tell me why you've come?" he said, his tone clipped and impatient.
Spike slouched low in his chair, nervous fingers picking at the upholstery, and tried to compose a sentence. I saw a ghost, Spike thought, and she told me to come to London. Love beyond the grave, blah, blah, blah. He didn't even know where to start.
"Is Buffy all right?" Spike asked suddenly, looking stricken. Giles supposed it would have been a display of heartbreaking concern had it not come from her attempted rapist.
"If you've come here sniffing for information on Buffy," the Watcher began, rising angrily from his chair. Hints of old Ripper, Spike supposed.
"No! I want to be useful. Make amends. Fix," Spike waved his hands about vaguely, "things.. Work for the higher good and all that rot."
Sitting back down, Giles rubbed his eyes, suddenly old again, myopic, and tired. "Really, Spike, can't you come up with something more plausible? You've always managed to. insinuate yourself where you aren't wanted, but you can hardly expect us to tolerate your presence now."
"Look!" Spike said hotly, and then pulled himself up short, rubbing his hands together to keep from ripping up the furniture. He was going to have to tell the truth. He hated telling the truth. Former Big Bad reveals all. Spike shuddered. "Look, let me tell you a story. I'll keep it short, and then you can decide what to do with me, all right? I'm throwing myself - well not on your mercy, obviously - but on your better judgment.
"When I left Sunnydale I went to Africa. There are demons," he licked his lips, wishing for some tea, or blood. He was ridiculously hungry. "There are demons that will grant any wish for a price, or a test."
"The chip," Giles gasped. In his hand, the teacup rattled frenetically on its saucer and threatened to spill.
Good, Spike thought; he could still scare people. That was worth something.
"No, the sodding chip is still there. I'm not telling this very well," Spike said, his hands creeping back to the arms of his chair like destructive, pale spiders. Communication had never been his thing. Who, after all, used the word effulgent? Bloody, poncy Victorian prats, that was who.
"Begin at the beginning," Giles advised, setting the traitorous teacup down on the table.
The beginning, Spike thought as he worried at a loose thread in the fabric, pulled hard enough to make a small hole. What was the beginning?
"I broke my word," Spike said thoughtfully, coving the rip he had made with the tip of his finger. "I told Buffy that I didn't do things that hurt her. And the thing is, I thought I was telling the truth. I didn't go there that night to attack her or try to. rape her. I wanted to talk. That was it."
"I really don't care about your intentions. Tell me what happened in Africa." Giles said, his voice hard to cover his outrage at the self- pitying vampire, his outrage at himself for having invited the monster in, for leaving Buffy to deal with the cruelties of the world on her own. Could any of this have happened if he'd remained in Sunnydale? Of course it could. The whole debacle with Angel proved that well enough. Giles loathed his ineffectualness as passionately as he hated the demon that was shredding the fabric of his favorite chair.
He glared at Spike, almost doubled over across the table from him, looking ashamed. But of course he couldn't be. Spike could act human at times, but that was all it was: a pantomime for their benefit. Giles was unimpressed.
"I spent so much time convincing her I wasn't a monster I think I convinced myself," Spike said to the teapot. He couldn't look at the Watcher any longer. "But I am a monster, an animal who harms the people he loves. That's not what I want, to be ruled by a demon. Don't get met wrong, it was fun. For a while it was a lot of fun, but I want control over my own actions. I want to know if it was me or the demon that could hurt her like that."
"Spike, you are the demon. Unless you wished for your humanity, in which case you would not have needed me to invite you in." Giles pondered, his mind scurrying off, as always, down myriad murky paths of possibility.
Oh to hell with the bloody convoluted explanations, Spike decided. "My soul. I survived the trials and the demon restored my soul," he said, still addressing the apathetic teapot.
"Oh. Oh I see. H-have you, ah, told Buffy?" Giles stammered, his busy mind suddenly, unexpectedly silent. He removed his spectacles and began massaging them with a white cloth to give his thoughts a chance to coalesce in the void.
Spike looked up then, evidently surprised by the question. "No. And I'm not going to. The best thing I can do is stay far away from Sunnydale. Try to be useful somewhere else. Back to that atonement thing."
"Yes," Giles said softly. "Yes I see. I don't know if I can instruct you in the art of remorse."
Spike shook his head. "I think I have the guilt complex down," he said with his familiar, cruel smile. "I just want to do something useful. Something good, far away from.where I was. I'll understand if you say no."
Giles took a sip of his tea, which had grown cold while he and the vampire spoke. There was an idea in the back of his head, a foolish idea really, and he was no longer that rash. Across the table from him the vampire jittered nervously in his seat, hardly presenting the continence of a trustworthy soul. A soul, if it was true. What would it take for a vampire to seek out a soul? Something new to research, Giles sighed and added it to his mental list.
"Well, there is something that needs to be done," Giles admitted reluctantly. "And I find myself too busy to.to.I am a bit overwhelmed at the moment. The thing is, someone should be looking after Willow. The ritual will be quite an ordeal. One of the members of the coven could care for her, I suppose, but it would be best if it were someone familiar. Even you, perhaps."
Well then, Spike blinked, Tara had been right after all. How about that?
"Sure," he said. "Yeah. I can keep an eye on Red for you."
"First," Giles said nervously, "I will require some proof that the chip is still, er, functional. I trust that more than any soul cooked up for you by some cave demon."
"Right," Spike said, vamping out and preparing himself for a headache. "One demonstration coming up."
Why oh why couldn't Tara's present have been to get rid of this blooming chip?
______________________________________________________________________
"Well this is just peachy," Spike said looking around the basement. "My crypt is posher than this."
Giles shot him a Look of Death, which Spike promptly ignored. He thought this Devon Coven was supposed to be something special, but here they were in a basement under a wine shop. Around them swirled people in cheap polyester robes walking carefully so as not to rub out the pentagram on the floor. Chalk, people? He wanted to say. At least use blood, or paint or.he had once used a spell that required a pentagram of molten lead. That had hurt, but still you know, class.
Then he saw Willow sitting in the far side of the room. She looked dirty and exhausted. When he caught her eye her expression was vacant, as though she didn't recognize him or Giles. Not bloody polite that, he thought.
"What's wrong with Red?"
"It's quite strenuous, attempting to end the world," Giles said with a hint of sarcasm. " We won't be able to approach her until the binding ritual is complete."
"Will it hurt her?" Spike asked. In his own ears he sounded dispassionate but he felt an uneasy twinge of.what? He tried to name the emotion. Regret? Compassion? Like playing name that tune with a stack of records you haven't heard since 1923. Or 1880, really, if they'd had phonographs back then. God technology was great. The soul on the other hand was making him feel a bit queasy.
When the members of the coven led Willow into the pentagram, Spike looked around to see if Tara was going to show. He didn't see her. Then the lights went out, the candles were lit, and even with his night vision he couldn't see much of anything. The binding was a bit of a lightshow in itself, of course. The coven chanted in an even rhythm, steady and soothing, although Willow, hugging herself in the center of the circle, looked terrified. As the air around her filled with scarlet light she began to shake, the red glow turned her skin a sickly shade and reflected in her soundless tears. Spike didn't know he had moved forward to help her until Giles caught his arm and pulled him sharply back. The cadence of the chant increased, faster in time with the light that was coalescing around Willow, growing almost solid, wrapping around her body. When the luminous ropes permeated her flesh she gasped and fell, her head making a sickening thump on the floor, smudging the chalk. But that didn't matter now. As the last of the light was absorbed into her skin the chanting slowed and stopped. The coven dispersed, leaving Willow alone and powerless on the floor.
Spike scuffled his heavy black boots over the neat white lines as he walked over to pick her up. In his arms Willow was as pale and light as one of Dru's dolls. Her head lolled back exposing her long neck. Not that he could do anything about it. But still, he thought, a thing of beauty that is.
"I guess she's my responsibility now," Spike said because Giles was staring at him, obviously expecting him to say something.
"Yes. Yes she is. I expect that you will take the utmost care of her."
Part One: The Host
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The burns were healing nicely. Spike sat in the shadows for days, growing glassy eyed and hungry, feeling his body knit itself back together. It was better to feel the bones grind and pop themselves into place than think about what he had done. The chip was in his head, the demon was in his bones, and the soul sat like pewter in his gut, heavy and dull.
Something scuffled in the sand to his left, the toe of a sneaker against the dirty cave floor. Spike shifted his eyes towards the sound.
"You're all sparkly," Tara said with a shy smile.
His mind, exhausted, did not question her presence. Tara in Africa, why not? Perhaps Buffy and her sundry sharp wooden objects were just around the corner. Sniffed him out looking for revenge. Xander Harris with his big axe at the ready.
"Glad you approve," Spike frowned. He supposed she meant the sodding soul.
Personally he was starting to think he had been better off without it. Cold as the moon, the soul shone a hard, pale light through his thoughts, harshly illuminating all his missteps and misconceptions. Before the plan had been clear: get the soul and then scurry back to Sunnydale. What would he have told the Slayer? Hello, doll, just thought I'd pop by and show you my shiny new soul. Had he really thought that? All better. No more evil. Start again. The simplicity was beautiful.
"I'm an idiot," he said with despair. Spike looked out into the sun that trapped him in the lurky demon's cave. One step into the daylight and he could end the whole stupid thing now. He rolled his head against the gritty cave wall towards Tara.
"I - I think you made the right choice," she nodded, hiding behind her hair.
Why did she bob her head like that, Spike wondered. It annoyed the fuck out of him. He should have wished the chip out. At least then he could have fed on her. He was hungry, and it would be nice to have something fresh and warm for a change. His stomach twisted. No, not on her, because she was kind, and she spoke more sense than the rest of that lot. How had they managed to survive for so long?
"Do you now?" asked Spike. "What do you know about my choices?"
Did she know about the bathroom? Had Buffy told everyone? He felt sick. Unsteadily he stood up and walked toward the witch, his hand against the wall to stabilize himself. Something was wrong.
"So...umn. are you Spike still, or William?" Tara shifted from foot to foot nervously.
"Still Spike. Just with a new type of headache, love." Bloody hell, she wasn't breathing. And she wasn't warm. He tilted his head with something approaching kindness. "What happened to you then?"
Tara smiled. Stupid girl smiled at everything. She smiled and lifted her curtain of hair and showed him her chest. Around the bullet hole the blood was glistening, but didn't smell like anything. It was an illusion, a way for her to tell the story without using any words.
Tara was disappointed by his reaction. Spike didn't look at all surprised, simply more dead than usual. Bits of light and bits of shadow standing in front of her looking bored and tired and, if she squinted, sparkly and clean in a way she would never have been able to see when she was alive. How like him to make such a futile romantic gesture. Better, Tara thought, than trying to destroy the world because you lost your lover, but still pretty pointless. He would begin to realize that soon enough, and she wanted to talk to him before the full implications settled in. What would he do when he realized he could never have Buffy now? Fall on a stake? That would typical of him.
"I'm sorry," Spike said, and to his surprise he was. Didn't take him too long to become a soft fuck, did it? "But I have enough dead people to haunt me, thanks all the same."
"I want you to do something for me," Tara said. "Please," she added, remembering her manners.
Spike shook his head. He didn't even want to hear the offer. Ghosts. Why can't some people just leave the living world alone? Then he laughed sharply. Tara stood patiently by.
"What's in it for me?" he asked finally, because with all the restrictions put on him by the demon, the chip and the soul, none of them prevented him from being selfish.
"I'll give you a present," Tara offered as though she was trying to bribe a child.
Spike paused, looking out into the sunlight, weighing his options. "I'm not going back to Sunnydale." He gave the caveat with something that resembled fear.
"No," Tara agreed. "You're not. Now hold still; this will hurt."
She reached out her cold hand to his chest and Spike screamed again. He wondered if this was what penitence was like.
______________________________________________________________________
London had not changed much since the last time he had been there. It was still dark and sooty. The road was slick from the polluted rain falling from the familiar dusky sky. No direct sunlight this evening. No more horseshit in the street either, sticking to his boots, or catching in his cloak, which was defiantly an improvement. Spike paused before a red Georgian door with no handle. He could just break through the deadbolt, but that wouldn't get him far so he knocked three times, politely. Carefully Spike listened to the sound of papers being shuffled aside, footsteps moving towards the entrance. There was a pause while his prey stood behind the door, peering through the peak-hole. No surprises then. Even so the door still opened.
"Hello, Watcher. Aren't you going to invite me in?" Spike asked with a sharp, cold grin.
Giles loomed in the doorway, hard, and weary, and unimpressed by this bit of bravado. Spike surmised the Watcher had spoken to Buffy and expected him to reach for a stake like a good father figure. He also felt an unexpected rush of compassion for Giles who longed to protect Buffy and all the Scoobies and was hopelessly under qualified. Nobody could protect Buffy better than she could protect herself. Spike stomped the feeling down someplace low and out of the way. Was this what the soul was going to do? Annoy his un-life with sorrow for the dead and pity for poncy Watchers? He had expected something more dramatic and.interesting.
"The chip's still in," he said, pointing two fingers at his forehead in what he hoped was a reassuring manner.
Standing in the door, Giles ran both hands through his graying hair and said nothing. Words, words to deal with Spike, didn't come to his mouth fast enough. There weren't enough words in the world.
Mentally he enumerated why he didn't have time for this. One, he had research to do regarding a rather annoying prophecy that would, with his luck, foretell of imminent danger and possibly death. Two, something would have to be done with Willow soon. The Devon Coven had almost finished preparing for the binding ritual, but she was giving them a most frightful time in the meanwhile. Three, there was an Edicitnafni demon eating children in Clapham, and he doubted anybody else was going to deal with it. All things considered, he really did not have time for Spike now. Or ever. But why would Spike be here at all? Loathing his own curiosity, Giles sighed and stepped aside.
"Very well. You may come in, Spike," Giles said, ushering the vampire through the door. "Although I don't guarantee I will allow you to leave."
"Yeah? Well, fair enough."
As Spike entered the living room his nose filled with the scent of dust, paper, and cracked leather bindings: the smells he had come to associate with Giles over the years. With a twinge of self-preservation, his eyes roamed the room searching for anything sharp and wooden. All he found was a tiny room crammed with ancient volumes shelved and stacked in no discernable order, a couch, two wing backed chairs, a table obscured by reams of paper, and a teapot covered in a tea-cozy. Of course Giles owned a tea-cozy. The man gave Brits the world over a bad name.
They sat down in the chairs by the fireplace like two gentleman preparing for a long, civil discussion about cigars or horse racing. Having removed the tea-cozy, Giles poured himself a fresh cup. Pointedly, he did not offer any to the vampire.
"Suppose you tell me why you've come?" he said, his tone clipped and impatient.
Spike slouched low in his chair, nervous fingers picking at the upholstery, and tried to compose a sentence. I saw a ghost, Spike thought, and she told me to come to London. Love beyond the grave, blah, blah, blah. He didn't even know where to start.
"Is Buffy all right?" Spike asked suddenly, looking stricken. Giles supposed it would have been a display of heartbreaking concern had it not come from her attempted rapist.
"If you've come here sniffing for information on Buffy," the Watcher began, rising angrily from his chair. Hints of old Ripper, Spike supposed.
"No! I want to be useful. Make amends. Fix," Spike waved his hands about vaguely, "things.. Work for the higher good and all that rot."
Sitting back down, Giles rubbed his eyes, suddenly old again, myopic, and tired. "Really, Spike, can't you come up with something more plausible? You've always managed to. insinuate yourself where you aren't wanted, but you can hardly expect us to tolerate your presence now."
"Look!" Spike said hotly, and then pulled himself up short, rubbing his hands together to keep from ripping up the furniture. He was going to have to tell the truth. He hated telling the truth. Former Big Bad reveals all. Spike shuddered. "Look, let me tell you a story. I'll keep it short, and then you can decide what to do with me, all right? I'm throwing myself - well not on your mercy, obviously - but on your better judgment.
"When I left Sunnydale I went to Africa. There are demons," he licked his lips, wishing for some tea, or blood. He was ridiculously hungry. "There are demons that will grant any wish for a price, or a test."
"The chip," Giles gasped. In his hand, the teacup rattled frenetically on its saucer and threatened to spill.
Good, Spike thought; he could still scare people. That was worth something.
"No, the sodding chip is still there. I'm not telling this very well," Spike said, his hands creeping back to the arms of his chair like destructive, pale spiders. Communication had never been his thing. Who, after all, used the word effulgent? Bloody, poncy Victorian prats, that was who.
"Begin at the beginning," Giles advised, setting the traitorous teacup down on the table.
The beginning, Spike thought as he worried at a loose thread in the fabric, pulled hard enough to make a small hole. What was the beginning?
"I broke my word," Spike said thoughtfully, coving the rip he had made with the tip of his finger. "I told Buffy that I didn't do things that hurt her. And the thing is, I thought I was telling the truth. I didn't go there that night to attack her or try to. rape her. I wanted to talk. That was it."
"I really don't care about your intentions. Tell me what happened in Africa." Giles said, his voice hard to cover his outrage at the self- pitying vampire, his outrage at himself for having invited the monster in, for leaving Buffy to deal with the cruelties of the world on her own. Could any of this have happened if he'd remained in Sunnydale? Of course it could. The whole debacle with Angel proved that well enough. Giles loathed his ineffectualness as passionately as he hated the demon that was shredding the fabric of his favorite chair.
He glared at Spike, almost doubled over across the table from him, looking ashamed. But of course he couldn't be. Spike could act human at times, but that was all it was: a pantomime for their benefit. Giles was unimpressed.
"I spent so much time convincing her I wasn't a monster I think I convinced myself," Spike said to the teapot. He couldn't look at the Watcher any longer. "But I am a monster, an animal who harms the people he loves. That's not what I want, to be ruled by a demon. Don't get met wrong, it was fun. For a while it was a lot of fun, but I want control over my own actions. I want to know if it was me or the demon that could hurt her like that."
"Spike, you are the demon. Unless you wished for your humanity, in which case you would not have needed me to invite you in." Giles pondered, his mind scurrying off, as always, down myriad murky paths of possibility.
Oh to hell with the bloody convoluted explanations, Spike decided. "My soul. I survived the trials and the demon restored my soul," he said, still addressing the apathetic teapot.
"Oh. Oh I see. H-have you, ah, told Buffy?" Giles stammered, his busy mind suddenly, unexpectedly silent. He removed his spectacles and began massaging them with a white cloth to give his thoughts a chance to coalesce in the void.
Spike looked up then, evidently surprised by the question. "No. And I'm not going to. The best thing I can do is stay far away from Sunnydale. Try to be useful somewhere else. Back to that atonement thing."
"Yes," Giles said softly. "Yes I see. I don't know if I can instruct you in the art of remorse."
Spike shook his head. "I think I have the guilt complex down," he said with his familiar, cruel smile. "I just want to do something useful. Something good, far away from.where I was. I'll understand if you say no."
Giles took a sip of his tea, which had grown cold while he and the vampire spoke. There was an idea in the back of his head, a foolish idea really, and he was no longer that rash. Across the table from him the vampire jittered nervously in his seat, hardly presenting the continence of a trustworthy soul. A soul, if it was true. What would it take for a vampire to seek out a soul? Something new to research, Giles sighed and added it to his mental list.
"Well, there is something that needs to be done," Giles admitted reluctantly. "And I find myself too busy to.to.I am a bit overwhelmed at the moment. The thing is, someone should be looking after Willow. The ritual will be quite an ordeal. One of the members of the coven could care for her, I suppose, but it would be best if it were someone familiar. Even you, perhaps."
Well then, Spike blinked, Tara had been right after all. How about that?
"Sure," he said. "Yeah. I can keep an eye on Red for you."
"First," Giles said nervously, "I will require some proof that the chip is still, er, functional. I trust that more than any soul cooked up for you by some cave demon."
"Right," Spike said, vamping out and preparing himself for a headache. "One demonstration coming up."
Why oh why couldn't Tara's present have been to get rid of this blooming chip?
______________________________________________________________________
"Well this is just peachy," Spike said looking around the basement. "My crypt is posher than this."
Giles shot him a Look of Death, which Spike promptly ignored. He thought this Devon Coven was supposed to be something special, but here they were in a basement under a wine shop. Around them swirled people in cheap polyester robes walking carefully so as not to rub out the pentagram on the floor. Chalk, people? He wanted to say. At least use blood, or paint or.he had once used a spell that required a pentagram of molten lead. That had hurt, but still you know, class.
Then he saw Willow sitting in the far side of the room. She looked dirty and exhausted. When he caught her eye her expression was vacant, as though she didn't recognize him or Giles. Not bloody polite that, he thought.
"What's wrong with Red?"
"It's quite strenuous, attempting to end the world," Giles said with a hint of sarcasm. " We won't be able to approach her until the binding ritual is complete."
"Will it hurt her?" Spike asked. In his own ears he sounded dispassionate but he felt an uneasy twinge of.what? He tried to name the emotion. Regret? Compassion? Like playing name that tune with a stack of records you haven't heard since 1923. Or 1880, really, if they'd had phonographs back then. God technology was great. The soul on the other hand was making him feel a bit queasy.
When the members of the coven led Willow into the pentagram, Spike looked around to see if Tara was going to show. He didn't see her. Then the lights went out, the candles were lit, and even with his night vision he couldn't see much of anything. The binding was a bit of a lightshow in itself, of course. The coven chanted in an even rhythm, steady and soothing, although Willow, hugging herself in the center of the circle, looked terrified. As the air around her filled with scarlet light she began to shake, the red glow turned her skin a sickly shade and reflected in her soundless tears. Spike didn't know he had moved forward to help her until Giles caught his arm and pulled him sharply back. The cadence of the chant increased, faster in time with the light that was coalescing around Willow, growing almost solid, wrapping around her body. When the luminous ropes permeated her flesh she gasped and fell, her head making a sickening thump on the floor, smudging the chalk. But that didn't matter now. As the last of the light was absorbed into her skin the chanting slowed and stopped. The coven dispersed, leaving Willow alone and powerless on the floor.
Spike scuffled his heavy black boots over the neat white lines as he walked over to pick her up. In his arms Willow was as pale and light as one of Dru's dolls. Her head lolled back exposing her long neck. Not that he could do anything about it. But still, he thought, a thing of beauty that is.
"I guess she's my responsibility now," Spike said because Giles was staring at him, obviously expecting him to say something.
"Yes. Yes she is. I expect that you will take the utmost care of her."
