Chapter 3

Rainy Days and Mondays

Sunnydale – April 30th

"Willow, wake up!" Tara implored. "We have to get to class. There's a prelim for the final. C'mon sweetie, we need to go." Tara nudged the sleeping form again. For her own part, Tara was up and dressed and had already eaten breakfast. Willow had promised to get up and meet Tara in the cafeteria, but she had never made it. Now, with only ten minutes left until class, Tara had run back to the dorm to find her quasi-roommate / lover still asleep in their bed.

"Five more minutes," Willow mumbled in her sleep.

"No," Tara said firmly. "You don't have five more minutes."

Willow rolled over and cracked an eye at Tara. "You're already dressed," she mumbled. "When did you get dressed?"

"An hour ago, Will. C'mon, we're already going to be late."

"Late for what?" Willow asked, her grip on consciousness fading tenuously.

"For class," Tara answered, growing exasperated.

"Class?" Willow asked. "But it's Sunday."

"Willow, it's Monday. It's ten minutes to nine on Monday morning."

"Oh crap," said Willow. She immediately began to hyperventilate. "But … but I'm not awake. I'm not ready. Mr. Johnson has a prelim for the final today. What am I going to do?" Tears began to form in Willow's eyes.

"Calm down sweetie," Tara said. "We can do this, just get up, throw on some clothes, and we'll get to class." She was trying to be reasonable, but a cautious glance over at the clock gave away her own apprehension.

"Wait!" Willow said suddenly. She pinched her brow in deep thought for a moment. "Grab me some Rosemary, quick."

"Willow, are you sure?" Tara asked.

"This is an emergency," Willow said firmly. "C'mon, hurry."

Tara walked over to the old wooden chest in the corner of the room. They had found it at an antique shop one afternoon for more than they could afford. It was perfect for holding their spell components, and they were disheartened that they couldn't afford it. The owner had noticed their interest in the piece, though, and had struck up a brief conversation.

"You girls like this one?" he'd asked.

"Yeah, a lot," Tara had replied enthusiastically. "But it's more than we can afford."

"Well, you don't want it anyway," the owner had replied. "This one's haunted," he'd said with great solemnity. "Of course, with all the antiques I have coming and going through here, the whole place is haunted. Every time I turn around, some spirit or other is making mischief."

"What kind of mischief?" Willow had asked curiously.

"Swapping price tags, for one" he'd replied, warming to the fact that there was someone who believed him. "Or hiding things as soon as a customer asks for them. Knocking things over, or scaring folks away. One keeps writing in my ledger, 'Mlle come back,' over and over and over. Damned inconvenient." He had nodded emphatically, as if the whole matter were settled. "Anyways," he'd added, "I wouldn't sell this to two nice girls like you. The spirit as came in this one is particularly vile."

"How so?" Willow had asked, only to immediately jump with a shriek. "It grabbed me!" she'd shouted. "On my … my … well it grabbed me, let's just leave it at that."

"Told ya," the owner had replied.

"We could help you out," Tara had said suddenly. "We can cleanse the place."

"I've heard that before," the old proprietor had replied.

"We can guarantee it," Tara had said, looking over at Willow for confirmation. "We'll do the cleansing and then come back in a week. If the spirits are gone, you give us the chest."

The work had been simple, but time consuming. However, the results of one lost Saturday had netted them this chest, a dresser, and several boxes of books as well. They had immediately put their spell components into the chest, arranging them in smaller boxes and bottles for easy access. From one of these bottles, Tara withdrew the rosemary Willow had asked for.

"Here you go," she said, bringing it over.

Willow took it and wrapped it with a bit of ribbon she'd picked up from her nightstand, and combined placed this in her lap. She closed her eyes and settled a vision of herself - showered, dressed, and ready for the day – in her mind. With a deep intake of breath, she began to chant.

"Flower green and ribbon smooth

An offering, Dianna, to thee

To adorn thy noble brow

In eternal beauty

In return I ask of you

Give to me I pray

Make me likewise arrayed

And ready for the day."

A small flash of light in her lap consumed the offering and transformed her into her vision. She hopped out of bed, feeling quite refreshed and ready for class. She grabbed her books and the two girls ran off across campus, hoping to be no more than five minutes late.

* * *

They wandered out of the lecture hall at eleven, exhausted. The prelim had been specifically designed to demoralize the students. The test itself was worth ten percent of their grade, and few would do better than a C. However, it would give them a taste for the final exam, which was worth a quarter of the grade. The gaps in their knowledge so painfully pointed out, they would spend the next two weeks studying.

Buffy was waiting at the door of the hall as the class shuffled out with their heads bowed low. She smiled briefly when Willow and Tara emerged. "Who died?" she asked.

"Hell-test," Willow murmured. "Compare and contrast the social, political, economic, and military aspects of the Greek, Roman, and the Byzantine empires," she quoted.

"The Romans had more toga parties," Buffy supplied helpfully.

"Actually, Greeks and Byzantines were fond of them also," Tara supplied.

Willow's stomach growled. "Forgot to envision breakfast," she said.

Buffy looked quizzically at her and raised her hand shoulder high. "Lost," she said.

"Sorry Buffy," Willow replied. "I kinda overslept this morning and had to get ready via magic. You know, whoof, poof, and you're dressed."

"Really? You can do that?" Buffy was impressed. "I need to learn that one. An extra hour of sleep could come in handy when I've spent the night in patrolsville."

"Willow and I spent the night studying," Tara replied.

"Hence the good answer on the toga question," Buffy affirmed.

"Actually, we were studying for the other exam coming up," Willow said.

"Yeah," Tara confirmed. "I kinda fell asleep about one o'clock. I don't know how long Willow was up."

"Five," Willow supplied. "Going over basic incantations for combat situations. There's some really interesting ones in there."

"So, you're really going to go through with it? The Witch's Trial," Buffy asked.

"Absolutely," Willow replied. "As soon as Giles mentioned that the Watchers' Council does witch certifications, I knew I needed to do it."

"Even though you know it's dangerous?" Buffy asked. "Giles said the trials can get out of control, you know. I mean, you have to fight demons, and even another witch. There's no way to control those kinds of circumstances. Things can happen. Bad thing. Besides, look at what happened to me. The Watchers don't have a great track record in this area."

When Buffy turned eighteen, she underwent a trial by the Watcher's. Unlike the test that Willow and Tara were going to pursue, hers had not been voluntary. Unbeknownst to her, she had been given a chemical mixture that took away her Slayer powers. Then she'd been locked in a house with a crazed vampire. She had walked away alive, but not all the watchers had.

The watchers who had been keeping the creature prior to the trial had all been killed, and one of them even turned into a vampire as well. Buffy had passed the test, but Giles hadn't. His job was to watch, to not interfere. However, as soon as he found out that they had lost control of the creature and the test had gone awry, he'd gone in to rescue her. She hadn't needed his rescue, but his disregard for his 'objective' status had gotten him fired as her watcher.

In his place, the Watchers had sent in Wesley Windam Price to supervise her. That was possibly an even more disastrous move than the test had been. In the end, Buffy had rejected the Watchers altogether. They had abandoned Wesley, not even giving him passage back to America. Since then, he'd become partners with Angel, the Vampire with a soul that had been Buffy's first love.

The whole thing was sufficient to prove that the Watchers were either not very good at what they did – which was hard to believe as they had been doing it for centuries – or that living on a Hellmouth set even the best laid plans to ruin. Buffy was inclined to believe the latter, although she didn't dismiss the former as unthinkable. Still, either way, she thought it a bad idea to allow Willow to pursue the testing.

The witch testing was necessary for any witch that wanted to use the Watchers collection of magical artifacts. They couldn't just hand the artifacts to anyone who came knocking; they needed to know that the individual could handle it before granting its use. The only way to know that was to put the witch or warlock in question through a series of tests. Given the scope of detail of the tests, it was unwise to wait until you needed something to undergo the trial. Most witches simply got the certification as a matter of course.

"Giles and I have been through this," Willow responded, frustrated at having to go through the same old argument again. "He's agreed to the trial, and that's that."

"It's more like you blackmailed him into it," Buffy snapped in reply. In truth, Willow had annoyed her way into getting the information, and then blackmailed her way into getting permission to take the trials.

Giles was opposed to the trials. A dear friend of his had been killed while taking the trial, and Giles himself had barely escaped decapitation. As a result, when he let mention of the existence of the trials slip once in conversation, he resolved to not allow the conversation to go any further and simply refused to discuss it further. But Willow had been relentless.

While Willow had been a practicing witch for only a year or so, she'd been an overachiever her entire life. It drove her to distraction to think that there was a test she could take, a certification she could achieve, and yet be denied the chance to try. Everything inside her longed for achievement – measurable achievement. She believed that she could pass any test, and she wanted the chance to prove it.

So, Willow had begun a campaign to change Giles mind. She had started by dropping hints (Boy, I think I'm learning so much about magic. I only wish I knew how much I really knew). She had then tried indignation (How can you possibly call yourself an educator when you hold out information from willing, eager students?) This had really been quite a stretch, since she hadn't been his student for two of years – and even then he'd actually only been the librarian, not an actual teacher. She had finally moved on to bribes (Hi Giles! In my spare time, I indexed all the magic texts by author, time period, and spell component).

"I think it was the brownies that finally did it," Tara said absently.

The last straw had in fact been the brownies. Willow had baked Giles a large batch of chocolate brownies and brought them by his store, The Magic Box. He was cataloging some new ceremonial urns from Peru when Willow had arrived.

"Hi Giles. Ooh, what are those? Peruvian, aren't they? Those are shaman's urns. I read about those. I read about a lot of things, you know. Like, did you know that there are certain summoning spells that actually cause you to switch places with a demon, rather than simply bringing him here? Oh, and did you know that birch bark can be used to cause confusion in certain species of sentient slug-beasts?" Willow had gotten all of that out in one breath. Giles had simply stared at her, dumbfounded. She had withered slightly under his gaze, but then looked down at the baking dish in her hands. "And, hey, look, brownies. And I think they're for you." She had dramatically checked the card. "Yep – it says right here, Rupert Giles. Imagine that. There's not too many Rupert Giles's around here, so I bet they're for you."

Giles, in typical fashion, had taken off his glasses and cleaned the lenses without saying a word. He had held them up to the light to check for spots, and as he gazed at them had asked distractedly, "If I tell you about the witch certification, will you go back to being Willow again?" Willow had shuffled her feet at the mild rebuke, but smiled in spite of herself. At last, he had nodded.

"You're the best! Oh, boy, can you tell me now?" Willow had practically jumped up and down with glee.

"Not right now, I still have to catalog these urns. Besides, I need to look a few things up. But I should have all the information by this weekend. Okay?"

"Excellent." Willow had beamed. "I better go tell Tara," she had said, and then turned to leave.

"Willow," Giles had called after her. "Leave my brownies."

Giles never did get any of the brownies, as Anya had seen an opportunity for profit and promptly sold them off to customers coming into the store. But, true to his word, and despite the loss of the brownies, Giles had sat down and explained the trials to Willow and Tara.

Although Giles had been willing to explain them, he hadn't been willing to sponsor the girls for the trials. They were too dangerous, and nothing would persuade him to place Willow and Tara in such a position.

"I didn't blackmail him," Willow protested. "We made a deal, fair and square." Willow was defensive about the subject, especially around Buffy. Buffy knew how dangerous the dark residents of Sunnydale were, and what Willow had done to get Giles agreement to the trials.

Willow had begun taking greater and greater chances while out on patrol. She'd set herself up against superior demonic opponents. She had repeatedly put her life on the line in an effort to prove the capability of her magic.

In the end, Giles had seen that there was no other course. He would agree to the trials on one condition. "If you pass the certification, I won't bug you anymore about taking chances on patrol or in combat." He had paused to let it let the option sink in. "But if you don't pass …"

Willow had finished the thought for him. "If I don't pass, I have to start paying attention to you?" She had been somewhat crestfallen by the realization.

"Oh, more than that. You will obey me when it comes to your use of witchcraft. No if's, and's or but's. You will not cast a single spell without my express permission."

And so Willow had become locked into the agreement. Putting her life on the line in the trials, and her freedom on the line in her pursuit to take them. And now the trials were only nine days away. Nine days, and Buffy was still trying to talk her out of it.

Willow pushed away from Buffy and Tara. "Aren't you going to lunch?" Buffy asked her.

"I've kinda lost my appetite," Willow responded. "Mondays, you know." She turned before Buffy could say anything more, and walked off.

"Why can't you just leave her alone?" Tara said, coming to Willow's defense. "It's decided. She needs your support now."

"Tara, this is dangerous. This is – "

"This is her choice," Tara replied hotly. "That's something none of you can ever get used to. Just like her being with me," she paused, wiping back a tear. "Taking the trials is her choice, whether you like it or not. Why can't you just be her friend for once?" Tara turned to leave, but then stopped. "You can't keep her from danger and you can't choose for her," she said without looking back.