Title: Perfectly Happy, part 8/8 -- There Is Only Me
Author: Anna
Rating: R
Disclaimer: Not mine.
Pairing: Angelus/Cordelia
Distribution: SU, Soulmates, Nothing Fancy. Anyone who has already archived it still has permission. Anyone else, let me know. Thank you.
Feedback: Please! niannah@hotmail.com
Notes: I began this story before AtS season 4 began airing in the US, so it's a relief and also a sad thing to reach the end. Thanks to everyone who has read and supported along the way, I appreciate it so much. Thanks especially to Ando, who has always been there, supportive with every sentence as I write, and Pato, who has always asked for more.
I hope this lives up to the wait. Thank you all.
________________________________________________________
The Scourge had washed his hair slowly, his thick-padded fingers massaging circles on his scalp. He liked using her shampoo. It smelled intimate. He saw her curves in the space inhabited by his body, his mind's eye bright with her honey skin. How nicely she contrasted with his alabaster. Milk and honey. Promised.
He had packed the photos while wrapped in her towel, and called a courier. By the time the kid on the bike arrived, he was half dressed. No leather now, it was covered in blood. And tonight was not for leather. Tonight was for something finer, something more elegant. She would come to him tonight.
So he donned expertly tailored pants of soft wool, a dark charcoal, almost black. Over that, a hand sewn, exquisite, dark crimson shirt, slim line, close to his skin. He left the top two buttons undone. His shoes were black, of the softest Italian leather. He wore a signet ring given him by Darla two centuries before, and cufflinks he had found in Paris one night, on the wrists of a finely dressed young gentleman who had tasted of recent absinthe.
He sat on the couch, his back to the darkening window. The sun had set mere minutes ago, and he felt the lingering light tingle at the top of his spine. Ice clinked in his Midleton. A rich old gold, twenty five years in the cask. No wonder the taste was strong on his tongue. It was older than childish champagne, richer than wine. The taste soaked into his new blood. He felt strong. A good kill. Not a clean kill, but a good one. He closed his eyes, savouring another mouthful of whiskey.
She would be here soon.
Cordelia was gone before the phone rang. Her own voice answered, echoing in the lobby. Gunn reached it just before the beep, running by the distraught Wesley to pick up the receiver.
And so she did not hear that they had found an orb in England, in a dusty vault of the Watchers' Council. She did not know that it was being sent post haste with someone the council trusted in this matter. Nor did she know that this messenger was also quite the magic man of late.
Wesley had ceased his sobbing, listening to Gunn on the phone.
"They're sending the orb?" he said weakly, his voice hollow.
"Yeah, man. What happened you?" Gunn bent down, and picked up a picture. "Oh my god," he said.
The orb had, in fact, already arrived. The council had decided that they were not fools. They could not get close enough to Angelus to turn him to dust, but they could turn him into the neutered vampire they could largely ignore, apart from biannual file updates. Rupert Giles made his impatient way through the airport, anxiety and fear etched onto his drawn face. The extended flight made him feel worn through and in need of sleep and a shower but there was no time for that now.
He flexed his fingers, holding them close to his old corduroy jacket, and watched the magic crackle from the tips forming web of sizzling energy over his hand. It disappeared when he clenched his hand into a fist and stuck it in his pocket. He needed to save it. He would need it all.
The customs official looked suspiciously at the ornate glass paperweight in its velvet lined presentation box. Giles smiled gamely. He sighed in relief when she replaced it in his holdall and he headed for the doors.
Cordelia walked as if two years had fallen away. Two years of visions, of pain, her own and others'. She was sick of it. So very sick of it all. So sick of demon blood on her favourite clothes, sick of fighting a losing battle against the darkness. She knew it, she knew it all along, that some day, possibly not too far away, on of those apocalypses would succeed. They would arrive ten seconds too late, they would have read the wrong damn book.
And now Angelus had killed Connor and Fred and Lilah. Connor and Fred had had it easy, they had merely been killed. Lilah had been destroyed.
He was not going to do that to her. She stood proud, her chin held at a regal angle. The vermilion of her dress made her skin glow with an inner gold. The wind played gently with her hair in the balmy sunset.
She walked towards the door and, before she reached it, watched it open into the shadows. His face glowed starkly white in the gloom inside her curtained apartment.
She reached the threshold and held his gaze.
"It looks like we are of a mind," she said, her eyes flicking over his clothes.
"So it appears," replied Angelus. He stood back from the doorway and asked her in. She stepped through the doorway. She knew her heart remained steady, and not a trace of fear would he smell.
He looked impressed.
"Do you want to see her?" He smiled wickedly.
"Yes," she replied. He watched her face. He could see a smile there, though hidden under the vestiges of her conscience.
He led the way to her bedroom and swung the door open. They stood either side of the doorway, leaning on the jambs.
She looked at the body. Apart from a slight queasiness that she overcame easily, she felt nothing. She was astonished. She felt nothing.
"Wow," she said. "I thought I'd care, you know, when I actually saw her."
Angelus laughed.
"I knew you wouldn't," he chuckled.
She folded her arms, saying nothing, simply looking.
The body was barely Lilah, except for the face. The usual glassy stare of a corpse. Where he had left skin, it had already turned waxy and bloodless. The blood was already becoming rusty where it had dried into the sheets. The lights he had set up still shone on the bed and heated up the air of the room.
She could smell that strange smell of human blood. It lacked the tang of copper, it was sweeter than that, more fulsome and cloying. Like his breath after he had killed Fred. He did not smell of blood now. He smelled of her shampoo and the air of his voice smelled faintly of whiskey.
She turned to him and smiled for the first time.
"Say thank you," she said.
He faced her.
"Thank you. For what, precisely?" His eyes twinkled.
"For saving you from her. For bringing her to you so you could have all this fun." He arched her eyebrows playfully, tilting her head towards the bed.
"Oh, Cordy," he purred. He smiled broadly. "Thank you. I mean it. Thank you."
"How long did she last?" Cordelia looked back towards the body.
"Almost six hours. I was pleasantly surprised. I wasn't expecting so much fun."
"Or wow, so much blood." Cordelia's nose wrinkled.
"Well, I was kinda expecting that."
"I guess you'd know." Her gaze remained on the body still spread obscenely on the bed. Angelus moved behind her and rested his hands lightly on her shoulders. He felt her tense ever so slightly as she looked at the body, so he began to rub her neck gently in circles, easing the tension away again. He took the opportunity to admire her. Green chiffon rustling so quietly only he could hear it. It clung to the curve of her back and over the firm roundness of her ass. Her shoulders were bare and honey, fronds of her dark hair contrasting with the softness of her skin. He continued to work circles on her neck with his thumbs as he moved closer to her, his body now brushing against hers.
"Comes with experience," he purred into her ear. He could feel her smile, and imagined the way her face shone. How he had coveted that smile when he was caged inside Angel. How the soul had failed to read her, read the deep darks inside his angelic Cordelia. He had striven to be deserving of her. It made him laugh. Look at her now, Angel, he said to that soul he felt watching him. Look at her now, in my arms.
As he gloated, she turned. She leaned seductively against the door jamb, her body mere inches from his own.
"So, the bed is occupied, huh?" she said, flashing flirtation in her eyes.
He smiled.
"Oh, I think of everything," he said smugly, walking by her into the room. He stood by the side of the bed and rolled Lilah's body in the sheet she lay on. She landed on the floor the other side of the bed with a thud, her limbs making awkward angles under the cotton.
Beneath the coppery, blood-stained sheet there was a plastic sheet, and under that, silk. Cordelia smiled indulgently.
"Apparently you do," she said.
Angelus marvelled at her. She had lost everything, and she stood there, beautiful and strident in green, slipping as easily into his world as she did that dress.
"Come," he said briefly, as he took her hand and led her back into the living room. It was lit with the warm light of candles and a small fire flickering happily in the grate. He put music on, something soft and classical. A waltz.
"I remember when this was pop," he said quietly as he turned with a smile.
"Oh, you older guys," laughed Cordelia as he swept her into his arms. He held her close and began to move, slowly at first, guiding her modern feet.
"We know how to dance," he murmured.
Giles sat in the back of the cab glancing fretfully from his watch to the window to the clock on the dashboard. Something had to be wrong. The time, the speed of the traffic, something. This was too slow. Too slow. One hand rested on his bag, fingers splayed over the shape of the case that held the orb.
Giles had never much cared for Angel apart from his influence over the Slayer, but this orb, this soul, was for the world. Giles knew his tactics. He was just warming up, and LA would only be the beginning.
When he kissed her he felt the frisson of pleasure ripple through her body. He kept his hand at the base of her spine, pressing her body close to his as he gently opened his mouth against hers, maintaining their sinuous rhythm with the gentle music. He felt her breath hot against his cheek. She slid her left hand up his neck and held his hair. He knew the sign. He kissed her more deeply, his tongue now tentatively meeting hers, his left hand sliding up her right arm and coming to rest on her shoulder blade. She wrapped her free arm around him, enveloping him in her smell and taste.
Their kisses became passionate, heated. He felt something frantic inside her, something that needed him, something that wanted him. He growled into her mouth, and she whimpered at the vibrations in his chest and jaw. His arms tightened possessively around her.
She felt her feet leave the floor. She felt his teeth at her neck, just below her earlobe. The pleasure and danger sent shocks deep into her belly, fizzling between her legs. She expected him to carry her to the bed and throw her down, but no. He remained there, kissing her mouth, her eyes, her neck, returning to her mouth, as she floated in his arms. He kept turning, stepping lightly to the music. He whispered her name, Cordy, Cordy, Cordy.
"We have all the time in the world," he said gently, smiling into her smile.
"Is there a faster way?" said Giles to the complacent driver. It seemed too incredible that the urgency of his mission could not infuse this man with greater haste, panic, even, to bring him to the Hyperion. He prayed Wesley would have everything ready for the spell.
The cab driver replied with a noncommittal shrug and made no adjustment to their route.
Giles clenched his fingers around the orb.
He finally relented, slipping one strap of her dress over her shoulder. He followed its trail with his lips. Her feet touched the floor once more as he bent to kiss the skin below her collarbone, his slightly stubbled jaw grazing tantalizingly against the curve of her breasts. She fisted her hands in his hair and brought him back to her mouth. She took a step back towards the pillar behind her and he pressed her against it, his body moulding against hers as she wrapped a long leg around his waist. His hand trailed along her thigh, resting under her knee, pulling her closer still, sensing her arousal now against him. He moved his hips and ground into her, eliciting breathy moans between kisses.
"Angelus," she whispered. It thrilled him.
"Say that again," he said, pulling her other leg around him and crushing her against the column.
"Angelus," she said, louder this time. She sought out his eyes and found them black with lust and delight. "Angelus, Angelus, Angelus. My Scourge."
He kissed her furiously, devouring her, his hands roaming roughly over all the skin he could find. Her shoes now kicked across the room, Cordelia clung to him desperately, her tongue and teeth finding their way to his neck and biting down hard. He growled into her ear and she bit again. She arched her body into him as his hands snaked up her back and began to lower the delicate zip at the side of her dress.
Giles had finally arrived. He half ran into the lobby of the Hyperion to find Wesley, looking dishevelled and exhausted, waiting with a tight, grim smile.
"Giles, you're here," he said. His voice cracked. Giles pretended not to notice.
"Yes," he said. "I have the orb."
"And I have everything else we'll need," Wesley replied. "This is Gunn, he'll be helping."
Giles nodded a brief hello.
"I am so sorry to hear of everything that has happened," he said.
Wesley simply nodded.
"It was you who persuaded the Council to send the orb?" he asked from under dark brows.
"Yes," said Giles. "You know how they are, especially on the subject of Angel."
"Quite," replied Wesley. "Quite."
Giles looked around and carried his holdall over to the reception desk.
"Where is Cordelia?" he asked as he took the orb carefully from the bag. He placed it on the desk and turned back to Wesley and Gunn, who were sharing an uncomfortable glance.
"We're not sure," replied Wesley. "Cordelia has been acting somewhat oddly of late."
"We think she's with the big bad vamp we're about to castrate," cut in Gunn. Disgust was evident on his face.
Wesley sighed in acquiescence.
Giles said nothing, but turned back to the intricately carved wooden box that held the orb.
"In that case," he said, "we had better begin as soon as possible."
The dress looked good on her but better on the floor, he thought, as he ran his hands over her skin. She still held on to his waist with her legs as he stumbled over his discarded shirt on the way to the bedroom. Her tiny, lacy, vermilion lingerie still punctuated the flow of her honey skin. Her hands worked at his belt, unbuckling it and pulling it from its loops. She opened his pants as he brought her through the doorway. The smell of blood was still sickly in the air. He laid her on the bed and crawled over her, his pants now discarded on the carpet.
Her face was flushed and her lips full of blood and passion. He kissed across her collarbone and listened to the thundering of her arteries, idly wondering if he would be able to resist his urge to kill her as she came in his arms. She moaned deliciously as he took her nipple into his mouth through green lace. Her demanding body rose against him. Her hands traced shapes of need over his shoulder blades. He felt her heat tingling into him from her burning skin.
He deftly undid her bra and flung it from the bed. His attention turned to her welcoming, womanly stomach. His hands tickled promises around the flimsy string of her lingerie.
They laid out the ingredients on the marble flagging precisely as described in figure seven point four. The deep, almost fungal smell of strong herbs filled the lobby, smoke trailing its lazy way towards the distant ceiling.
"Woo!" said Gunn, his nose crinkling. "That is a disturbing odour."
"Yes," agreed Wesley absently. He tinkered with the arrangement, making sure each was perfectly aligned. Giles gently put out his hand and stopped him, reassurance in his eyes. Wesley sighed, and sat back. His frown, however, did not lift.
Giles's reassurance was false. His one previous experience with the Spell of Restoration did not imbue him with confidence.
He took out the old, slightly dog-eared print out Willow had made from Jenny's computer years ago. Jenny. The name still brought a pang.
He cleared his throat as Gunn waved the smoking herbs in the air. Gunn's cynical expression mirrored Giles's feeling precisely.
Cordelia looked beautiful in the heat of lovemaking, he thought to himself. Luscious and abandoned and utterly, utterly uninhibited. He could give it to her any way he pleased, he thought to himself, and she would take it. He fully planned on testing that hypothesis during the gloriously long days ahead, debauched days and bloody nights.
She would never be Darla, but she had her own deadly allure. Not that he would turn her. Turn her, and the fun is over. That was not the point with his disintegrating Cordelia.
This was the point, he thought, as he punished her with his forceful thrusts. She whimpered, pain and pleasure fighting it out deep inside her.
"Cordelia," he said, his voice low and grating as gravel. Her eyes flickered open. When she saw his face she half smiled through her raw desperation for release.
"Angelus," she managed to say, before biting down fiercely on her own lip.
Angelus licked up the blood and felt it tingle on his tongue. She sparked. She glowed.
She fucked like a woman destroyed.
"Quod perditum est, in venietur," intoned Giles, looking around the Hyperion lobby as if he expected to see the airy shapes of the very spirits he summoned. "Not dead, nor not of the living, spirits of the interregnum I call."
The orb began to glow, gently at first, but then a deeper orange.
Gunn's eyes lit up.
"Man, that's his soul?" he whispered to Wesley.
Wesley nodded, his own eyes fixed also on the orb.
Angel's soul. Angel's leash.
To his horror, Wesley found himself wondering if Angel really wanted it back.
"Let him know the pain of humanity," continued Giles. His eyes could barely rest on the page as the energy of the words began to crackle in the air. "Gods bind him, cast his heart from the demon realm. Te implor Doamne, nu ignora accasta rugaminte! Lasa orbita sa fie vasul carei va transporta sufletul la el!" Giles mustered all his courage. "Este scris, aceasta putere este dreptul poporuil meu de a conduce... Asa sa fie! Acum!"
The last word reverberated with a power far, far from natural. The air itself was painful as energies ripped it molecule from molecule, lightning danced and the air was thick and sharp with the smell of ozone.
Wesley, Giles and Gunn held on in the middle of the magical storm, watching the last orb of Thessulah, waiting for it to disappear.
Angelus watched her face as she came. He felt her squeeze him so tightly, as if she never wanted to let him go. As if he was all she had.
He felt his own release ripping through him, quicksilver burning his old arteries, shooting through his nerves. And something else, a deeper hum and throb of energy he could not quite grasp in his mind, something thrumming and low in the air.
"Angelus!" she gasped, the final ebbs of her orgasm breaking over her like waves. "Angelus," she repeated with a breath of satiation.
"Cordy!" he replied. His eyes were black with shock, staring into her own as she lay under him. His face contorted.
His eyes glowed orange and she felt the thrill of danger tingle through her.
"Angelus," she said again, smiling, reaching her arms around him, daring him to sink his fangs in. Her eyes glinted darkly.
He shook his head, his face now a mask of pain.
"No," he spluttered. "Aw, come on, a few more hours!" He shut his eyes and his entire body arched into her before collapsing over her body, his limbs suddenly drained and powerless, his chest heaving with a habit he had almost forgotten.
Cordelia ran her hands through his hair. She was concerned now.
"Angelus?" she said uncertainly, trying to lift his head to see his face.
She did not have to. He raised his head himself and merely looked at her.
Her face fell horribly. Her eyes widened and her mouth opened in shock.
He raised himself wordlessly to his knees, slipping out if her as he did so. He sat back on his legs.
Cordelia scrambled backwards and hugged herself against the headboard.
"Angel," she whispered hoarsely.
His face barely flickered.
"Yes," he said. Once again his brow wore that heavy expression of pain.
This time, however, he did not wear it for the pain he had inflicted.
The storm died. Somewhere in the crackle and light the orb had disappeared.
Wesley, Giles and Gunn sagged, power draining from their limbs as the magic dissipated. They looked from one to the other.
"So what now?" said Gunn. "We wait and see if the champion comes home?"
Wesley shrugged.
"I guess so," he said.
It all seemed so anticlimactic.
Giles folded the sheet of paper, once more thoughts of Jenny pushed aside.
"The orb is gone," he said. "Unless there are circumstances of which we are not aware, Angel is once again ensouled."
Wesley pushed himself up form the floor, stiff limbs complaining.
"In which case, I think we can expect him at some point, if even just to tell us that Angelus is no longer a threat."
Gunn nodded and stood.
"So we wait," he said. "Great."
Cordelia covered her nakedness with a pillow. Angel kneeled before her on the bed, his head heavy and his shoulders tense. He held his forehead with a hand.
"Angel," she whimpered again. "Angel, I'm sorry."
He shook his head, a laugh suggesting itself on his lips. He lowered his hand and looked at her.
"There is nothing I can say," he said evenly. "And, before you begin, there is nothing you can say."
She expected the sting of tears at his words. Yet there were none. Her chest should have felt hollow, but it did not. She looked into his dark, accusatory eyes and expected shame and remorse. Yet nothing came.
This crushed her more than guilt, more than love.
She blindly pushed herself from the bed and tripped over Lilah's corpse, still lying grotesquely under the sheet on the floor. She staggered to her feet and looked frantically around, retrieving her clothes. Angel sat, dark, silent and naked on the bed, simply waiting for her to leave.
"Just so we're clear," he said as she reached the door. "I never want to see you again."
It was then that she saw it clearly. She saw it all, spread out before her as if built of crystal, sparkly and flawless.
Angel was always prepared for the return of Angelus, just as Angelus was always prepared for the return of Angel. He had traded his own freedom for her destruction.
It was perfect.
"You want to let him win?" she found herself asking.
Angel half turned to her.
"Him?" he said quietly. "You of all people know there's only me."
His dark outline loomed on her suddenly small bed. His powerful body, once protective, still held the menacing shape she had come to know too well. His face was expressionless.
She finally turned her back, and walked out of the room. He heard the gentle rustle of chiffon. He heard her gather a few things, throw them in some bag or other. And then he heard her leave the apartment and pull away in his car.
He looked around him at the lonely sheets. Through the smell of blood, he could smell her. He leaned forward, bent double, burying his face in the sheets. He filled his lungs with her, grasping the sheets into thick handfuls. He curled into them, wrapping her around him. The heat she had left there seeped into his body and he savoured every second through the crushing, hollow pain.
They waited all night and all day, their anxiety and copious amounts of coffee keeping them awake. They even managed to laugh, once or twice, as they sat and sipped in the lobby. Laughter born of hope and buried fears. It had been almost twenty four hours since they performed the restoration, and yet they had faith. He was probably waiting until he felt he could face them, they said to each other.
The sun had sunk well below the western rim when his dark form had appeared at the door. It was Wesley who stood to open it.
"I'm afraid I still can't invite you in," he said. "Not until we're sure."
Angel smiled, though there was nothing friendly in his face. He leaned down and took hold of a large bundle on the ground beside him, and stepped forward through the doorway.
"She's not here anymore, Wes," he said. "See how quickly she forgets her home?" He threw the bundle wrapped in a sheet onto the ground. "Lilah," he said, his voice devoid of feeling. "I wouldn't open it, if I were you."
Wesley stepped back, his face shocked to numbness. He covered his mouth, suppressing rising bile. Giles and Gunn quickly came to stand behind him, Gunn holding out a supporting hand.
Giles turned to Angel.
"Angel?" he said.
"Rupert," replied Angel, in a voice that made fear dance coldly along his spine.
"Where's Cordelia?" asked Giles. "Was she with you?" He thought he saw a flash of something, a glimpse of pain on Angel's face, but he lowered his eyes, and when he raised them again the look had fled.
"She was with me when you did your little restoration curse, yes," replied Angel. "It worked, by the way. I can see by your faces that you're wondering."
Wesley had calmed enough to look at Angel once more. Gunn simply looked angry.
"See, there's something I forgot, and I allowed you to forget," continued Angel in his monotone. "Something Cordelia remembered." He took a step closer to the group almost huddled in front of him. "I'm a vampire," he said.
There was a coldness in his eyes that chilled all three men to the bone.
He cast a final glance over the lobby before leaving, his eyes briefly resting on the wrapped corpse on the ground. Cordelia's smell was on those sheets still.
Then he turned and vanished into the darkness outside.
They remained staring into the empty blackness for long minutes, until one by one they shook themselves and looked around. Wesley's sad eyes found Lilah's shape in the tightly wrapped sheet. Gunn glanced towards the weapons cabinet. Giles walked slowly to the reception desk and ran his hands over the box that had contained the last known Orb of Thesulah, until magics once again seeped into the world.
Angel felt their eyes on his back long after he walked far away from the Hyperion. He glanced at the sky. There was plenty of night left, hours for him to roam, and brood, and watch life from the sidelines as he had for many lonely decades.
Screw that, said a voice inside. Let's party.
Just this once, he told himself, just this one time, maybe I'll listen.
THE END.
Author: Anna
Rating: R
Disclaimer: Not mine.
Pairing: Angelus/Cordelia
Distribution: SU, Soulmates, Nothing Fancy. Anyone who has already archived it still has permission. Anyone else, let me know. Thank you.
Feedback: Please! niannah@hotmail.com
Notes: I began this story before AtS season 4 began airing in the US, so it's a relief and also a sad thing to reach the end. Thanks to everyone who has read and supported along the way, I appreciate it so much. Thanks especially to Ando, who has always been there, supportive with every sentence as I write, and Pato, who has always asked for more.
I hope this lives up to the wait. Thank you all.
________________________________________________________
The Scourge had washed his hair slowly, his thick-padded fingers massaging circles on his scalp. He liked using her shampoo. It smelled intimate. He saw her curves in the space inhabited by his body, his mind's eye bright with her honey skin. How nicely she contrasted with his alabaster. Milk and honey. Promised.
He had packed the photos while wrapped in her towel, and called a courier. By the time the kid on the bike arrived, he was half dressed. No leather now, it was covered in blood. And tonight was not for leather. Tonight was for something finer, something more elegant. She would come to him tonight.
So he donned expertly tailored pants of soft wool, a dark charcoal, almost black. Over that, a hand sewn, exquisite, dark crimson shirt, slim line, close to his skin. He left the top two buttons undone. His shoes were black, of the softest Italian leather. He wore a signet ring given him by Darla two centuries before, and cufflinks he had found in Paris one night, on the wrists of a finely dressed young gentleman who had tasted of recent absinthe.
He sat on the couch, his back to the darkening window. The sun had set mere minutes ago, and he felt the lingering light tingle at the top of his spine. Ice clinked in his Midleton. A rich old gold, twenty five years in the cask. No wonder the taste was strong on his tongue. It was older than childish champagne, richer than wine. The taste soaked into his new blood. He felt strong. A good kill. Not a clean kill, but a good one. He closed his eyes, savouring another mouthful of whiskey.
She would be here soon.
Cordelia was gone before the phone rang. Her own voice answered, echoing in the lobby. Gunn reached it just before the beep, running by the distraught Wesley to pick up the receiver.
And so she did not hear that they had found an orb in England, in a dusty vault of the Watchers' Council. She did not know that it was being sent post haste with someone the council trusted in this matter. Nor did she know that this messenger was also quite the magic man of late.
Wesley had ceased his sobbing, listening to Gunn on the phone.
"They're sending the orb?" he said weakly, his voice hollow.
"Yeah, man. What happened you?" Gunn bent down, and picked up a picture. "Oh my god," he said.
The orb had, in fact, already arrived. The council had decided that they were not fools. They could not get close enough to Angelus to turn him to dust, but they could turn him into the neutered vampire they could largely ignore, apart from biannual file updates. Rupert Giles made his impatient way through the airport, anxiety and fear etched onto his drawn face. The extended flight made him feel worn through and in need of sleep and a shower but there was no time for that now.
He flexed his fingers, holding them close to his old corduroy jacket, and watched the magic crackle from the tips forming web of sizzling energy over his hand. It disappeared when he clenched his hand into a fist and stuck it in his pocket. He needed to save it. He would need it all.
The customs official looked suspiciously at the ornate glass paperweight in its velvet lined presentation box. Giles smiled gamely. He sighed in relief when she replaced it in his holdall and he headed for the doors.
Cordelia walked as if two years had fallen away. Two years of visions, of pain, her own and others'. She was sick of it. So very sick of it all. So sick of demon blood on her favourite clothes, sick of fighting a losing battle against the darkness. She knew it, she knew it all along, that some day, possibly not too far away, on of those apocalypses would succeed. They would arrive ten seconds too late, they would have read the wrong damn book.
And now Angelus had killed Connor and Fred and Lilah. Connor and Fred had had it easy, they had merely been killed. Lilah had been destroyed.
He was not going to do that to her. She stood proud, her chin held at a regal angle. The vermilion of her dress made her skin glow with an inner gold. The wind played gently with her hair in the balmy sunset.
She walked towards the door and, before she reached it, watched it open into the shadows. His face glowed starkly white in the gloom inside her curtained apartment.
She reached the threshold and held his gaze.
"It looks like we are of a mind," she said, her eyes flicking over his clothes.
"So it appears," replied Angelus. He stood back from the doorway and asked her in. She stepped through the doorway. She knew her heart remained steady, and not a trace of fear would he smell.
He looked impressed.
"Do you want to see her?" He smiled wickedly.
"Yes," she replied. He watched her face. He could see a smile there, though hidden under the vestiges of her conscience.
He led the way to her bedroom and swung the door open. They stood either side of the doorway, leaning on the jambs.
She looked at the body. Apart from a slight queasiness that she overcame easily, she felt nothing. She was astonished. She felt nothing.
"Wow," she said. "I thought I'd care, you know, when I actually saw her."
Angelus laughed.
"I knew you wouldn't," he chuckled.
She folded her arms, saying nothing, simply looking.
The body was barely Lilah, except for the face. The usual glassy stare of a corpse. Where he had left skin, it had already turned waxy and bloodless. The blood was already becoming rusty where it had dried into the sheets. The lights he had set up still shone on the bed and heated up the air of the room.
She could smell that strange smell of human blood. It lacked the tang of copper, it was sweeter than that, more fulsome and cloying. Like his breath after he had killed Fred. He did not smell of blood now. He smelled of her shampoo and the air of his voice smelled faintly of whiskey.
She turned to him and smiled for the first time.
"Say thank you," she said.
He faced her.
"Thank you. For what, precisely?" His eyes twinkled.
"For saving you from her. For bringing her to you so you could have all this fun." He arched her eyebrows playfully, tilting her head towards the bed.
"Oh, Cordy," he purred. He smiled broadly. "Thank you. I mean it. Thank you."
"How long did she last?" Cordelia looked back towards the body.
"Almost six hours. I was pleasantly surprised. I wasn't expecting so much fun."
"Or wow, so much blood." Cordelia's nose wrinkled.
"Well, I was kinda expecting that."
"I guess you'd know." Her gaze remained on the body still spread obscenely on the bed. Angelus moved behind her and rested his hands lightly on her shoulders. He felt her tense ever so slightly as she looked at the body, so he began to rub her neck gently in circles, easing the tension away again. He took the opportunity to admire her. Green chiffon rustling so quietly only he could hear it. It clung to the curve of her back and over the firm roundness of her ass. Her shoulders were bare and honey, fronds of her dark hair contrasting with the softness of her skin. He continued to work circles on her neck with his thumbs as he moved closer to her, his body now brushing against hers.
"Comes with experience," he purred into her ear. He could feel her smile, and imagined the way her face shone. How he had coveted that smile when he was caged inside Angel. How the soul had failed to read her, read the deep darks inside his angelic Cordelia. He had striven to be deserving of her. It made him laugh. Look at her now, Angel, he said to that soul he felt watching him. Look at her now, in my arms.
As he gloated, she turned. She leaned seductively against the door jamb, her body mere inches from his own.
"So, the bed is occupied, huh?" she said, flashing flirtation in her eyes.
He smiled.
"Oh, I think of everything," he said smugly, walking by her into the room. He stood by the side of the bed and rolled Lilah's body in the sheet she lay on. She landed on the floor the other side of the bed with a thud, her limbs making awkward angles under the cotton.
Beneath the coppery, blood-stained sheet there was a plastic sheet, and under that, silk. Cordelia smiled indulgently.
"Apparently you do," she said.
Angelus marvelled at her. She had lost everything, and she stood there, beautiful and strident in green, slipping as easily into his world as she did that dress.
"Come," he said briefly, as he took her hand and led her back into the living room. It was lit with the warm light of candles and a small fire flickering happily in the grate. He put music on, something soft and classical. A waltz.
"I remember when this was pop," he said quietly as he turned with a smile.
"Oh, you older guys," laughed Cordelia as he swept her into his arms. He held her close and began to move, slowly at first, guiding her modern feet.
"We know how to dance," he murmured.
Giles sat in the back of the cab glancing fretfully from his watch to the window to the clock on the dashboard. Something had to be wrong. The time, the speed of the traffic, something. This was too slow. Too slow. One hand rested on his bag, fingers splayed over the shape of the case that held the orb.
Giles had never much cared for Angel apart from his influence over the Slayer, but this orb, this soul, was for the world. Giles knew his tactics. He was just warming up, and LA would only be the beginning.
When he kissed her he felt the frisson of pleasure ripple through her body. He kept his hand at the base of her spine, pressing her body close to his as he gently opened his mouth against hers, maintaining their sinuous rhythm with the gentle music. He felt her breath hot against his cheek. She slid her left hand up his neck and held his hair. He knew the sign. He kissed her more deeply, his tongue now tentatively meeting hers, his left hand sliding up her right arm and coming to rest on her shoulder blade. She wrapped her free arm around him, enveloping him in her smell and taste.
Their kisses became passionate, heated. He felt something frantic inside her, something that needed him, something that wanted him. He growled into her mouth, and she whimpered at the vibrations in his chest and jaw. His arms tightened possessively around her.
She felt her feet leave the floor. She felt his teeth at her neck, just below her earlobe. The pleasure and danger sent shocks deep into her belly, fizzling between her legs. She expected him to carry her to the bed and throw her down, but no. He remained there, kissing her mouth, her eyes, her neck, returning to her mouth, as she floated in his arms. He kept turning, stepping lightly to the music. He whispered her name, Cordy, Cordy, Cordy.
"We have all the time in the world," he said gently, smiling into her smile.
"Is there a faster way?" said Giles to the complacent driver. It seemed too incredible that the urgency of his mission could not infuse this man with greater haste, panic, even, to bring him to the Hyperion. He prayed Wesley would have everything ready for the spell.
The cab driver replied with a noncommittal shrug and made no adjustment to their route.
Giles clenched his fingers around the orb.
He finally relented, slipping one strap of her dress over her shoulder. He followed its trail with his lips. Her feet touched the floor once more as he bent to kiss the skin below her collarbone, his slightly stubbled jaw grazing tantalizingly against the curve of her breasts. She fisted her hands in his hair and brought him back to her mouth. She took a step back towards the pillar behind her and he pressed her against it, his body moulding against hers as she wrapped a long leg around his waist. His hand trailed along her thigh, resting under her knee, pulling her closer still, sensing her arousal now against him. He moved his hips and ground into her, eliciting breathy moans between kisses.
"Angelus," she whispered. It thrilled him.
"Say that again," he said, pulling her other leg around him and crushing her against the column.
"Angelus," she said, louder this time. She sought out his eyes and found them black with lust and delight. "Angelus, Angelus, Angelus. My Scourge."
He kissed her furiously, devouring her, his hands roaming roughly over all the skin he could find. Her shoes now kicked across the room, Cordelia clung to him desperately, her tongue and teeth finding their way to his neck and biting down hard. He growled into her ear and she bit again. She arched her body into him as his hands snaked up her back and began to lower the delicate zip at the side of her dress.
Giles had finally arrived. He half ran into the lobby of the Hyperion to find Wesley, looking dishevelled and exhausted, waiting with a tight, grim smile.
"Giles, you're here," he said. His voice cracked. Giles pretended not to notice.
"Yes," he said. "I have the orb."
"And I have everything else we'll need," Wesley replied. "This is Gunn, he'll be helping."
Giles nodded a brief hello.
"I am so sorry to hear of everything that has happened," he said.
Wesley simply nodded.
"It was you who persuaded the Council to send the orb?" he asked from under dark brows.
"Yes," said Giles. "You know how they are, especially on the subject of Angel."
"Quite," replied Wesley. "Quite."
Giles looked around and carried his holdall over to the reception desk.
"Where is Cordelia?" he asked as he took the orb carefully from the bag. He placed it on the desk and turned back to Wesley and Gunn, who were sharing an uncomfortable glance.
"We're not sure," replied Wesley. "Cordelia has been acting somewhat oddly of late."
"We think she's with the big bad vamp we're about to castrate," cut in Gunn. Disgust was evident on his face.
Wesley sighed in acquiescence.
Giles said nothing, but turned back to the intricately carved wooden box that held the orb.
"In that case," he said, "we had better begin as soon as possible."
The dress looked good on her but better on the floor, he thought, as he ran his hands over her skin. She still held on to his waist with her legs as he stumbled over his discarded shirt on the way to the bedroom. Her tiny, lacy, vermilion lingerie still punctuated the flow of her honey skin. Her hands worked at his belt, unbuckling it and pulling it from its loops. She opened his pants as he brought her through the doorway. The smell of blood was still sickly in the air. He laid her on the bed and crawled over her, his pants now discarded on the carpet.
Her face was flushed and her lips full of blood and passion. He kissed across her collarbone and listened to the thundering of her arteries, idly wondering if he would be able to resist his urge to kill her as she came in his arms. She moaned deliciously as he took her nipple into his mouth through green lace. Her demanding body rose against him. Her hands traced shapes of need over his shoulder blades. He felt her heat tingling into him from her burning skin.
He deftly undid her bra and flung it from the bed. His attention turned to her welcoming, womanly stomach. His hands tickled promises around the flimsy string of her lingerie.
They laid out the ingredients on the marble flagging precisely as described in figure seven point four. The deep, almost fungal smell of strong herbs filled the lobby, smoke trailing its lazy way towards the distant ceiling.
"Woo!" said Gunn, his nose crinkling. "That is a disturbing odour."
"Yes," agreed Wesley absently. He tinkered with the arrangement, making sure each was perfectly aligned. Giles gently put out his hand and stopped him, reassurance in his eyes. Wesley sighed, and sat back. His frown, however, did not lift.
Giles's reassurance was false. His one previous experience with the Spell of Restoration did not imbue him with confidence.
He took out the old, slightly dog-eared print out Willow had made from Jenny's computer years ago. Jenny. The name still brought a pang.
He cleared his throat as Gunn waved the smoking herbs in the air. Gunn's cynical expression mirrored Giles's feeling precisely.
Cordelia looked beautiful in the heat of lovemaking, he thought to himself. Luscious and abandoned and utterly, utterly uninhibited. He could give it to her any way he pleased, he thought to himself, and she would take it. He fully planned on testing that hypothesis during the gloriously long days ahead, debauched days and bloody nights.
She would never be Darla, but she had her own deadly allure. Not that he would turn her. Turn her, and the fun is over. That was not the point with his disintegrating Cordelia.
This was the point, he thought, as he punished her with his forceful thrusts. She whimpered, pain and pleasure fighting it out deep inside her.
"Cordelia," he said, his voice low and grating as gravel. Her eyes flickered open. When she saw his face she half smiled through her raw desperation for release.
"Angelus," she managed to say, before biting down fiercely on her own lip.
Angelus licked up the blood and felt it tingle on his tongue. She sparked. She glowed.
She fucked like a woman destroyed.
"Quod perditum est, in venietur," intoned Giles, looking around the Hyperion lobby as if he expected to see the airy shapes of the very spirits he summoned. "Not dead, nor not of the living, spirits of the interregnum I call."
The orb began to glow, gently at first, but then a deeper orange.
Gunn's eyes lit up.
"Man, that's his soul?" he whispered to Wesley.
Wesley nodded, his own eyes fixed also on the orb.
Angel's soul. Angel's leash.
To his horror, Wesley found himself wondering if Angel really wanted it back.
"Let him know the pain of humanity," continued Giles. His eyes could barely rest on the page as the energy of the words began to crackle in the air. "Gods bind him, cast his heart from the demon realm. Te implor Doamne, nu ignora accasta rugaminte! Lasa orbita sa fie vasul carei va transporta sufletul la el!" Giles mustered all his courage. "Este scris, aceasta putere este dreptul poporuil meu de a conduce... Asa sa fie! Acum!"
The last word reverberated with a power far, far from natural. The air itself was painful as energies ripped it molecule from molecule, lightning danced and the air was thick and sharp with the smell of ozone.
Wesley, Giles and Gunn held on in the middle of the magical storm, watching the last orb of Thessulah, waiting for it to disappear.
Angelus watched her face as she came. He felt her squeeze him so tightly, as if she never wanted to let him go. As if he was all she had.
He felt his own release ripping through him, quicksilver burning his old arteries, shooting through his nerves. And something else, a deeper hum and throb of energy he could not quite grasp in his mind, something thrumming and low in the air.
"Angelus!" she gasped, the final ebbs of her orgasm breaking over her like waves. "Angelus," she repeated with a breath of satiation.
"Cordy!" he replied. His eyes were black with shock, staring into her own as she lay under him. His face contorted.
His eyes glowed orange and she felt the thrill of danger tingle through her.
"Angelus," she said again, smiling, reaching her arms around him, daring him to sink his fangs in. Her eyes glinted darkly.
He shook his head, his face now a mask of pain.
"No," he spluttered. "Aw, come on, a few more hours!" He shut his eyes and his entire body arched into her before collapsing over her body, his limbs suddenly drained and powerless, his chest heaving with a habit he had almost forgotten.
Cordelia ran her hands through his hair. She was concerned now.
"Angelus?" she said uncertainly, trying to lift his head to see his face.
She did not have to. He raised his head himself and merely looked at her.
Her face fell horribly. Her eyes widened and her mouth opened in shock.
He raised himself wordlessly to his knees, slipping out if her as he did so. He sat back on his legs.
Cordelia scrambled backwards and hugged herself against the headboard.
"Angel," she whispered hoarsely.
His face barely flickered.
"Yes," he said. Once again his brow wore that heavy expression of pain.
This time, however, he did not wear it for the pain he had inflicted.
The storm died. Somewhere in the crackle and light the orb had disappeared.
Wesley, Giles and Gunn sagged, power draining from their limbs as the magic dissipated. They looked from one to the other.
"So what now?" said Gunn. "We wait and see if the champion comes home?"
Wesley shrugged.
"I guess so," he said.
It all seemed so anticlimactic.
Giles folded the sheet of paper, once more thoughts of Jenny pushed aside.
"The orb is gone," he said. "Unless there are circumstances of which we are not aware, Angel is once again ensouled."
Wesley pushed himself up form the floor, stiff limbs complaining.
"In which case, I think we can expect him at some point, if even just to tell us that Angelus is no longer a threat."
Gunn nodded and stood.
"So we wait," he said. "Great."
Cordelia covered her nakedness with a pillow. Angel kneeled before her on the bed, his head heavy and his shoulders tense. He held his forehead with a hand.
"Angel," she whimpered again. "Angel, I'm sorry."
He shook his head, a laugh suggesting itself on his lips. He lowered his hand and looked at her.
"There is nothing I can say," he said evenly. "And, before you begin, there is nothing you can say."
She expected the sting of tears at his words. Yet there were none. Her chest should have felt hollow, but it did not. She looked into his dark, accusatory eyes and expected shame and remorse. Yet nothing came.
This crushed her more than guilt, more than love.
She blindly pushed herself from the bed and tripped over Lilah's corpse, still lying grotesquely under the sheet on the floor. She staggered to her feet and looked frantically around, retrieving her clothes. Angel sat, dark, silent and naked on the bed, simply waiting for her to leave.
"Just so we're clear," he said as she reached the door. "I never want to see you again."
It was then that she saw it clearly. She saw it all, spread out before her as if built of crystal, sparkly and flawless.
Angel was always prepared for the return of Angelus, just as Angelus was always prepared for the return of Angel. He had traded his own freedom for her destruction.
It was perfect.
"You want to let him win?" she found herself asking.
Angel half turned to her.
"Him?" he said quietly. "You of all people know there's only me."
His dark outline loomed on her suddenly small bed. His powerful body, once protective, still held the menacing shape she had come to know too well. His face was expressionless.
She finally turned her back, and walked out of the room. He heard the gentle rustle of chiffon. He heard her gather a few things, throw them in some bag or other. And then he heard her leave the apartment and pull away in his car.
He looked around him at the lonely sheets. Through the smell of blood, he could smell her. He leaned forward, bent double, burying his face in the sheets. He filled his lungs with her, grasping the sheets into thick handfuls. He curled into them, wrapping her around him. The heat she had left there seeped into his body and he savoured every second through the crushing, hollow pain.
They waited all night and all day, their anxiety and copious amounts of coffee keeping them awake. They even managed to laugh, once or twice, as they sat and sipped in the lobby. Laughter born of hope and buried fears. It had been almost twenty four hours since they performed the restoration, and yet they had faith. He was probably waiting until he felt he could face them, they said to each other.
The sun had sunk well below the western rim when his dark form had appeared at the door. It was Wesley who stood to open it.
"I'm afraid I still can't invite you in," he said. "Not until we're sure."
Angel smiled, though there was nothing friendly in his face. He leaned down and took hold of a large bundle on the ground beside him, and stepped forward through the doorway.
"She's not here anymore, Wes," he said. "See how quickly she forgets her home?" He threw the bundle wrapped in a sheet onto the ground. "Lilah," he said, his voice devoid of feeling. "I wouldn't open it, if I were you."
Wesley stepped back, his face shocked to numbness. He covered his mouth, suppressing rising bile. Giles and Gunn quickly came to stand behind him, Gunn holding out a supporting hand.
Giles turned to Angel.
"Angel?" he said.
"Rupert," replied Angel, in a voice that made fear dance coldly along his spine.
"Where's Cordelia?" asked Giles. "Was she with you?" He thought he saw a flash of something, a glimpse of pain on Angel's face, but he lowered his eyes, and when he raised them again the look had fled.
"She was with me when you did your little restoration curse, yes," replied Angel. "It worked, by the way. I can see by your faces that you're wondering."
Wesley had calmed enough to look at Angel once more. Gunn simply looked angry.
"See, there's something I forgot, and I allowed you to forget," continued Angel in his monotone. "Something Cordelia remembered." He took a step closer to the group almost huddled in front of him. "I'm a vampire," he said.
There was a coldness in his eyes that chilled all three men to the bone.
He cast a final glance over the lobby before leaving, his eyes briefly resting on the wrapped corpse on the ground. Cordelia's smell was on those sheets still.
Then he turned and vanished into the darkness outside.
They remained staring into the empty blackness for long minutes, until one by one they shook themselves and looked around. Wesley's sad eyes found Lilah's shape in the tightly wrapped sheet. Gunn glanced towards the weapons cabinet. Giles walked slowly to the reception desk and ran his hands over the box that had contained the last known Orb of Thesulah, until magics once again seeped into the world.
Angel felt their eyes on his back long after he walked far away from the Hyperion. He glanced at the sky. There was plenty of night left, hours for him to roam, and brood, and watch life from the sidelines as he had for many lonely decades.
Screw that, said a voice inside. Let's party.
Just this once, he told himself, just this one time, maybe I'll listen.
THE END.