Flashback: 1582

Elizabeth was bored. She was being dragged along on an outing with her parents and several other families, but unfortunately, Willow and her parents were not among them. Seven years old and nothing to do…

Her main source of discontent was the fact that all the children around were either too young and hanging on to their mothers, or too grown-up to bother with a younger girl like her. She sighed emphatically, hoping that one of the older children might take interest in her….no such luck.

As the outing continued, the party stopped in a picturesque spot by a riverbank to rest, with long weeping willows trailing into the water and soft ripples generated by the pebbles thrown into the water by the young gentlemen and older boys.

Elizabeth looked on in scorn. Now completely fed up with the lack of activity, Elizabeth began to wander further away from the party. Singing softly to herself, she drifted off into a world of her own…

"Ouch!" Elizabeth was jolted out of her contemplation somewhat roughly as a boy perhaps her age, perhaps a year older charged right into her. She found herself sitting on the ground and blinked in surprise. He had knocked her right over.

Stunned but not hurt, Elizabeth did not cry. She looked up at the boy and found him staring rather anxiously down at her, chewing the nails of one hand apprehensively with the other stuffed into his pocket. On further inspection, she noted he appeared to be rather dirty, and must have been a working boy or the son of a labourer, judging by his longish, roughly cut hair, coarse, unrefined shirt, ragged waistcoat, and torn, ripped trousers. He was barefoot, as were many of his sort, and he looked out at her from his dishevelled locks with wide, soft brown eyes.

Shaking out her long golden curls as she picked herself up, Elizabeth dusted off her new blue dress and looked right back at the boy as he continued to stare.

"I'm all right," She finally addressed him. He blinked, as if he hadn't expected to be spoken to.

"Sorry," He mumbled. She gave him a reassuring smile and all of a sudden he returned it with the widest and most friendly grin Elizabeth had ever seen.

"I'm Alexander." He said.

"My name's Elizabeth Summers," returned she.

"Everyone calls me Xander," the boy added, as an afterthought. Elizabeth stared wide eyed. No one had ever called her anything but her given name. To her, it seemed impossibly grown-up to be called something else. Not to be outdone, she thought quickly.

"Everyone calls me…" Elizabeth scanned the forested area in which they stood, her eyes skipping over bright flowers, soft grass, and the fluffy pollen spheres floating around…That was it. Fluffy. That would do, she thought, her mind racing.

"Fluffy," the newly christened Fluffy announced. Xander frowned, cocking his head to one side like a puzzled puppy. He scratched his ear as if he had not heard right.

"Did you say…Buffy?"

Buffy sighed. Out on the deck a sharp breath of wind whipped her hair unceremoniously up around her face and stung her eyes, and she fought to keep her skirts down as the boat plunged down once more into the crevice of a wave. As they rose on the crest of the next, Buffy reflected that she would miss Xander more than her father and Angel put together. And she hadn't even seen him about the town to say goodbye.

Although Willow and Buffy were both rich young ladies of noble birth, the fact that Xander Harris was a common labouring boy had never, not in all their years together, deterred either of them from keeping his company. He was scruffy and poor, but he you couldn't have found a more entertaining and amusing boy anywhere, and both girls were never in doubt of his heart of gold.

Consistently unlucky in love, Xander had courted several girls and always seemed to find himself in trouble. His one serious relationship had been with a noblewoman named Cordelia Chase, a 'friend', if she could be called that, of Buffy and Willow. Cordelia had given up her dignity, class and reputation to step out with Xander, her first act of selflessness, but the relationship had collapsed when she had discovered him kissing Willow. The two betrayers (Willow was stepping out with Oz at the time) had not been in love, and after being discovered they split up. Cordelia reverted to type, Willow got engaged to Oz, and Xander was once again left to himself.

Not that he was bad looking.

He just needs to find the right girl, Buffy pondered the thought.

It was while Buffy was thinking about Xander that she felt a hand reach out and tap her shoulder. Not expecting it, she jumped and shrieked.

Willow stepped back, eyes wide. Buffy sighed and relaxed, and Willow began to laugh. Oz stood beside her, smiling.

"It's not funny Will. I could have fallen overboard!" Buffy dramatized. Willow raised an eyebrow in a way that clearly said 'of course…not'. She shook her head and grinned.

"I had to find you. You'll never guess who's on board the ship!" Buffy shrugged, uninterested. Willow smiled even wider, her green eyes sparkling with excitement.

"Forgoing his trade of bakery, leaving behind his work as a labourer, and becoming the greatest sailor time has ever known, in his own words at least, is….Xander Harris!" She announced. Buffy stared in disbelief.

Talk about coincidence…she mused. Then she allowed the news to sink in, and grinning, demanded his whereabouts.

"Working in the kitchen at the moment." Oz dropped in. Being the only men in their group, Oz and Xander were great friends.

"I saw him earlier, but he hasn't had a chance to speak to use or explain how he got here because they're working him so hard. Also…" Willow continued, smiling. "He's falling in love with the cook's daughter, Anya. Have you seen her? She's doing maid work on the ship, until we get to England."

"I've seen her," Buffy nodded, remembering seeing the girl who had been cleaning the cabins that morning. "She's very pretty. I hope she doesn't break our boy's heart!"

The two girls laughed, and Buffy had to admit, free of her parents, with her best friends by her side, a summer abroad wasn't starting to look so bad after all.

* * * *

At the same time Buffy and her friends were laughing on the ship, a man was getting robbed in the outskirts of London.

His carriage was bumping steadily along the London Road, one of many that led into the vast capital. It was late evening, and the road was deserted. Either side of the track, tall threatening trees loomed over head, and grew blacker as the daylight faded.

The driver whistled a tune to himself as he flicked the horses with his whip. Under his seat, a loaded blunderbuss lay for protection. These roads were not safe, especially not at night. Thieves, beggars, and tramps worked the roads, looking for whatever they could make off with.

And the most dreaded of them all, the highwaymen, those that were fearless, carrying pistols, blunderbusses, swords, and flanked by gangs of others who surrounded you silently, without you even realising.

As the man travelling in the carriage was soon to realise.

"Stand and deliver!" A clear voice rang out, over the crunching of wheels on the ground, and putting a sharp end to the driver's whistling. The passenger's breath stopped short with shock. A fear so deep and penetrating to be called horror flooded his heart, and he gripped the side of the carriage until his knuckles stood out violently white against the red of his fingers.

"Your money or your life," The highwayman called again, in the time honoured phrase of those like him.

There was silence for a moment. Then-

"I warn you, I'm armed!" The driver had to be admired for his courage, but it did nothing. There was laughter, highly amused, deep and daunting...

"So am I," The voice smirked, and then all the passenger heard was his driver's sharp intake of breath a split-second before a deafening bang rocked him to the core.

A moment later, the highwayman's voice found it's way back to the man's ringing ears.

"….get out. Keep you hands where I can see them and bring your money with you,".

Shaking, the man stepped out. He couldn't look anywhere but at the ground as he kept his hands above his head, and he thought, although he couldn't be sure in the rapidly disappearing light, that there were shadows flittering here and there in the trees. The highwayman's gang.

He heard a soft clink as the man who'd held him up dropped down from his horse. For the first time, he raised his eyes to his attacker.

He saw a man, slimmer and more languid than he would have expected, standing by an intimidating black stallion. The horse was well bred, and had without a doubt been stolen.

The man himself made a striking picture, despite his slender physique. His hair was so blonde as almost to be white, and his eyes, currently narrowed between amusement and concentration, were calculating, coldly intelligent and bright blue.

He wore no cloak, only black trousers, a crisp white shirt and black silk waistcoat, covered by a long black leather coat. There was a sword slung at his side, and a pistol in his hand.

The passenger's eyes slid towards the driver's body. There was a gaping hole in his chest. The passenger closed his eyes and swallowed hard.

* * * * *