[NOTE! Okay desu! Another chapter becomes done. By my best estimate's there's really a lot left of this, so... Anyway, hopefully I'll have more done relatively quickly. It's still pretty fresh, so it comes fast.]
Color Magic
Part one: Demons
Willow Rosenberg gave a lopsided grin and swept her arms across the view of the city. "Welcome to Cleveland."
Spike raised an eyebrow, a healthy distance away from the window of the terminal. "Why Cleveland?"
"Hellmouth," she answered, "It's our base of operations."
Silently, Buffy elbowed past him and walked into the airport proper, making a show of standing in the waning sunlight. Spike frowned just a little bit.
"What do you expect, man?" a husky voice came from behind him, "That's our Buffy for you. Let her think you're dead, and she gets pissy... hmm..."
Spike turned slowly and glared at Faith. "I was dead."
The dark-haired slayer shrugged. "You got better, yeh?"
"Some of us do not remain dust," a swirl of blue noted as Illyria strode past them, "Even should it be for the best."
Willow half-smiled. "Believe me, Buffy knows more about that than you know."
Illyria turned to her, making eye contact for possibly the first time since they met in the alley last night. Willow's mirth died down slightly, and something warmed and chilled her simultaneously.
"You know, you look really..."
"I grow weary of sitting," Illyria interrupted Willow, "Let us move on."
Sighing, Spike rolled his eyes. "Hate to say it, but hypothermia's right. We should hurry up to your base, or whatall."
Faith elbowed him, and he followed her gaze to see Buffy just barely not looking at him. He wasn't sure he was aggravated or pleased. "The sun's about down anyway. Let's get our luggage," Faith added.
Willow nodded. "Okay," she smirked, leading the way, "I hope you guys don't mind a mostly empty house for the time being."
"Remind me again why you thought it was smart for just the five of us to fly out here?" Spike asked pointedly as he began to follow after her.
"You guys are targets," Faith answered, "Wolfram and Hart'll probably come after you guys in no time flat. No safer place than our headquarters."
"You leave your army in Los Angeles," Illyria noted, following in her hurriedly slow way, "And you cart us to sit atop a maw of Tartarus. I hope there is a hidden strategy I am blind to."
Willow turned slightly, that weird feeling returning. "Don't worry, it's the safest place you could be, even without the Slayers. Don't forget who you're with."
They walked on silently for a time, Buffy still refusing to accept Spike's presence.
"Who are we with?" Illyria asked suddenly.
Spike grinned lopsidedly. "Wil there is about the strongest witch I've ever seen, and the two baddest-ass Slayers of all time are flanking you. Plus, I expect the Watcher has something concocted."
"Watchers, plural," Buffy's voice came from in front of him, "We've got forty active watchers, and another hundred in training. This time, we're doing it right."
Spike smiled a little, and Faith surreptitiously jabbed him with her elbow again.
"What is a Slayer, exactly?" Illyria asked plainly.
--
"What is this?" Giles asked of the Tangoranegri demon in front of him.
It pushed the small package farther into his face and repeated, "A favor from Wyndam-Pryce."
Giles sighed. "But what, in exact? In fact, I challenge you to give me one good reason that I should believe you."
"Because you always beat him at fencing," the demon explained.
Giles blinked in surprise. "And always found time for tea after."
"Yes," the demon nodded, "Anything but chamomile."
With a deep breath, Giles accepted the package and said softly, "Thank you."
The demon shrugged. "Anything for Wyndam-Pryce. I never met the man, but he did wonders for us Tangoras."
"He was a good man," Giles nodded softly, "We will do all we can to keep his memory alive."
The Tangoranegri smiled, a tremendous, curling affair, disrupting the human-appearing face. "Then you'll have friends in town. See you around, Watcher." And with that, the demon turned and strode away from the motel door.
"What was that about?" Colleen asked from behind Giles.
He turned, opening up the package gravely. "A code that Wesley and I set up over four years ago, not long after he came to work with Angel. We had said it only once before, and never wrote it down."
The envelope's flap gave way, and a stack of DVD discs slid out, clattering onto the nearby bed.
"This was from him."
Caridad, the other Slayer in the room, strode over and picked up one of the DVDs, which was labeled with black marker. The words, however, were in some ancient script, and meaningless to the two Slayers.
"What is it?" Colleen asked.
Giles picked one up as well. "Well, discs, I wouldn't guess. But of what..." he trailed off, reading the marker, "Oh my..."
The Slayers watched him expectantly as he sifted through the other discs, numbering twenty-three in total. "And?"
"Oh, sorry," Giles apologized distractedly, "It was... Ahem. This is a collection of tomes thought lost forever. Most of the documents the original council sought after for years..."
He spread all the discs, the thin plastic cases clattering on the bed, "They're all right here..."
And when he turned, his eyes were little moist, and a half smile adorned his features.
"This won't be forgotten, Wesley Wyndam-Pryce," Giles whispered to no one, then to the girls, "Come on, we have books to read."
--
Spike slowly turned in place, taking in the compound.
Then he did it again.
"A bloody apartment building..." he said, slightly impressed.
Willow smiled at him. "The new council does things right. We've got smaller footholds all around the world, but this is the heart of the whole thing."
"I expect you to have overseen the protective field," Illyria commented to Willow, putting a hand forward, "Do you use the scythe as a condensor for the energies?"
Willow blinked. "Uh, what?"
"A spell of this magnitude would require a focal point," Illyria noted, touching the ground, "I am not daft in the ways of Arcanum."
The redhead furrowed her brow. "Yeah, but... how did you know about that?"
Spike looked over, and for the tiniest of moments, Illyria looked... different. It was hard to place what flickered across her eyes.
"It..." the demon goddess paused, "It is elementary to detect. Your magic is strong, but crude. That artifact calls out as a beacon."
Willow frowned again. "If you're from before Slayers, doesn't that mean you're from before the scythe too?"
And there that fleeting thing was again, sparking through Illyria's gaze. Slightly, she turned her face away, and quickly added, "I have read through many tomes, Mage. I know of this world."
And the Spike knew what it was he saw.
She was embarrassed.
--
"C'mon, B, aren't you gonna talk to him?"
Buffy looked away from the punching bag, which was ever the worse for wear. "What?"
Faith came around behind it, holding it steady. Buffy resumed punching for a moment, a little dust falling from the ceiling of the basement. "Well?" Faith asked.
"Look," the blonde sighed, pushing some loose hair out of the way, "I don't wanna talk about this. Just hold the bag."
Faith frowned. She held the bag anyway, though.
--
Spike sipped on his beer impatiently. This was not the time for inaction. He should be out in the field, in L.A., looking for the missing members of their team. Hell, he actually had a team for once. He owed it to them.
Willow had taken Illyria into another room, apparently with the purpose of seeing if she could help with the spells, and ancient lore that protected the building. Spike, on the other hand, was told he could have whatever he wanted out of the fridge.
It felt like a waste, however he looked at it.
More times than once, he felt like throwing the bottle against the wall and dashing to where he could hear Buffy below them. There were only a handful of people in the building, and he could tell those punches anywhere.
But yet he sat, reading the label on the mediocre-quality beer the fridge held. He was pretty sure he could guess its owner in one.
"You're alive!" A voice came from the doorway, "And you're drinking my beer!"
Spike almost grinned as he looked up to see Xander Harris staring at him in open shock. "You could afford better, mate."
Xander made an emphatically questioning gesture and sat down. "I heard you were back, but I had to see it to believe it."
Spike shot a look at his false eye. It was a good match.
"Though I guess you could be a cardboard cutout as far as I know," he smiled, tapping his eye, something that made Spike want to cringe for some reason.
"Nope," Spike sighed, "Thick as ever."
Xander's smile took a moment off, and the whole look fell apart. "Yeah. I can figure. Look, I just wanted to say... I'm glad you're not dead."
Spike stopped in mid-swig to look at the other man. A questioning glance was all that was required.
"Yeah, we never got along, but... You gave your life for the right reasons. I can appreciate that."
The beer came down, and Spike pulled out another and thrust it at Xander. "Hollow sacrifice," Spike thumped his chest.
Xander shrugged. "You didn't know that," he noted, drinking some beer, "I wish we could get back everyone we lost, but this's a start."
Spike lifted his bottle in toast. "I'll drink to that. Thanks."
And they drank.
--
Willow had no way to tell, but she thought Illyria was acting strangely. She seemed both eager to get the tour of the magics done with, and incredibly interested in all of it. Strangest of all was her reluctance to make any kind of eye contact.
Willow didn't press the issue, however, as the confusion eye contact evoked was an uncomfortable addition to looking into those cold blue saucers.
"Where do you keep the scythe?"
Willow grimaced. "Sorry, that's a secret. I'm the only one who knows where it is," she lied. Buffy, Giles, and Xander all had that knowledge, but it was policy not to reveal that fact.
"Wait!" Willow exclaimed, pointing a finger at Illyria as they stopped in the middle of a hallway, "You said you could sense it!"
Illyria turned at the exclamation, and their eyes locked for a long moment. Soon, the demoness's eyes began to dart, as though searching for a forgotten excuse.
"Why are you..." Willow trailed off as some kind of realization tried to crawl out of her brain.
Illyria suddenly turned away, staring angrily out the window. "You work some manner of sorcery on me, Mage, and I fail to appreciate it."
Willow furrowed her brow further. Illyria was silhouetted against the window, the dark night sky stark against her pale flesh. The contour of her profile was striking, and It made Willow stumble over something in her mind.
"Wh... what are you talking about?" Willow asked, distracted with trying to piece something together.
And the blue woman looked at her, some alien realization on here face. She looked ready to flee, but something seemed to hold her there.
"Cease your toying with me!" she shouted at Willow, "You seek to destroy me in the name of the shell! It is easy to figure when the memories are read!"
In chunks, the realization fell at once, first discontiguous and overwhelming, then gradually settling into a horribly cold revelation. She should have seen it immediately. It was only through such a radical change that she dismissed the possibility subconsciously.
"Oh my god..." Willow reached forward, touching her hands to the woman's cheeks with the lightest of touches, almost afraid of the contact, but not able to stop.
"Oh god... Fred?"
The blue woman drew a breath in sharply and pushed Willow away sharply, almost toppling her. "No!" Illyria exclaimed with unprecedented fury.
Willow knitted her brow, willing an understanding that refused to come. This was why they hadn't mentioned Fred. Willow had assumed the other girl missing, and had failed to see her right in front of her eyes. It was how she knew about the scythe; Willow often informed Fred of her spells, and Fred did the same with her experiments. They had become something of pen pals over the past year... and then it had stopped.
"You..." Willow said with increasing mistrust, "You're not her, are you?"
Illyria had backed into the shadows, only her chilling face visible in the moonlight. "I am as I claimed to be, Mage. I am an old one, lords of this land from a time unremembered."
"But... what happened to..." Willow said slowly, not liking where this was going.
Illyria stepped forward, arms open in a gesture of non-violence. "The shell's soul, her essence, is lost to us, destroyed in my reincarnation. There is only Illyria in this carcass, Mage. What would you do to me in response?"
Willow stumbled backwards, leaning against a windowsill to not fall. "You... you killed her?"
For a moment, Illyria seemed to consider what she would say, and then she swooped forward, closing half of the distance between them. "Yes! In my return to your world, she was melted from inside like the scum humans are! I destroyed your comrade! What will you do in return? Hurry, Mage! Make your choice!"
Disgust raged through Willow, and she felt the twinges of hatred biting at her mind. Her eyes raced, trying to land anywhere but on those pools of decay, but always failing. The only thing she could think of was Fred, sweet and kind and smiling and brilliant, lending a needed light to a dark place.
And now that light was denied forever.
Willow shook for a moment, and red energies crackled between her hands. Illyria stood fast, something pitiful in her eyes. For a moment, green met blue, and Willow suddenly blinked, realization clearing just enough of her mind.
"No," Willow stated, "I can't do it... I shouldn't."
"Fool!" Illyria shouted, "You cannot tell your enemy from your friend?"
Willow breathed deeply. "No, I really can't. How about you?"
Falling forward onto Willow, the blue demoness sucked air in sharply and whispered, "I wish I could not..."
Color Magic
Part one: Demons
Willow Rosenberg gave a lopsided grin and swept her arms across the view of the city. "Welcome to Cleveland."
Spike raised an eyebrow, a healthy distance away from the window of the terminal. "Why Cleveland?"
"Hellmouth," she answered, "It's our base of operations."
Silently, Buffy elbowed past him and walked into the airport proper, making a show of standing in the waning sunlight. Spike frowned just a little bit.
"What do you expect, man?" a husky voice came from behind him, "That's our Buffy for you. Let her think you're dead, and she gets pissy... hmm..."
Spike turned slowly and glared at Faith. "I was dead."
The dark-haired slayer shrugged. "You got better, yeh?"
"Some of us do not remain dust," a swirl of blue noted as Illyria strode past them, "Even should it be for the best."
Willow half-smiled. "Believe me, Buffy knows more about that than you know."
Illyria turned to her, making eye contact for possibly the first time since they met in the alley last night. Willow's mirth died down slightly, and something warmed and chilled her simultaneously.
"You know, you look really..."
"I grow weary of sitting," Illyria interrupted Willow, "Let us move on."
Sighing, Spike rolled his eyes. "Hate to say it, but hypothermia's right. We should hurry up to your base, or whatall."
Faith elbowed him, and he followed her gaze to see Buffy just barely not looking at him. He wasn't sure he was aggravated or pleased. "The sun's about down anyway. Let's get our luggage," Faith added.
Willow nodded. "Okay," she smirked, leading the way, "I hope you guys don't mind a mostly empty house for the time being."
"Remind me again why you thought it was smart for just the five of us to fly out here?" Spike asked pointedly as he began to follow after her.
"You guys are targets," Faith answered, "Wolfram and Hart'll probably come after you guys in no time flat. No safer place than our headquarters."
"You leave your army in Los Angeles," Illyria noted, following in her hurriedly slow way, "And you cart us to sit atop a maw of Tartarus. I hope there is a hidden strategy I am blind to."
Willow turned slightly, that weird feeling returning. "Don't worry, it's the safest place you could be, even without the Slayers. Don't forget who you're with."
They walked on silently for a time, Buffy still refusing to accept Spike's presence.
"Who are we with?" Illyria asked suddenly.
Spike grinned lopsidedly. "Wil there is about the strongest witch I've ever seen, and the two baddest-ass Slayers of all time are flanking you. Plus, I expect the Watcher has something concocted."
"Watchers, plural," Buffy's voice came from in front of him, "We've got forty active watchers, and another hundred in training. This time, we're doing it right."
Spike smiled a little, and Faith surreptitiously jabbed him with her elbow again.
"What is a Slayer, exactly?" Illyria asked plainly.
--
"What is this?" Giles asked of the Tangoranegri demon in front of him.
It pushed the small package farther into his face and repeated, "A favor from Wyndam-Pryce."
Giles sighed. "But what, in exact? In fact, I challenge you to give me one good reason that I should believe you."
"Because you always beat him at fencing," the demon explained.
Giles blinked in surprise. "And always found time for tea after."
"Yes," the demon nodded, "Anything but chamomile."
With a deep breath, Giles accepted the package and said softly, "Thank you."
The demon shrugged. "Anything for Wyndam-Pryce. I never met the man, but he did wonders for us Tangoras."
"He was a good man," Giles nodded softly, "We will do all we can to keep his memory alive."
The Tangoranegri smiled, a tremendous, curling affair, disrupting the human-appearing face. "Then you'll have friends in town. See you around, Watcher." And with that, the demon turned and strode away from the motel door.
"What was that about?" Colleen asked from behind Giles.
He turned, opening up the package gravely. "A code that Wesley and I set up over four years ago, not long after he came to work with Angel. We had said it only once before, and never wrote it down."
The envelope's flap gave way, and a stack of DVD discs slid out, clattering onto the nearby bed.
"This was from him."
Caridad, the other Slayer in the room, strode over and picked up one of the DVDs, which was labeled with black marker. The words, however, were in some ancient script, and meaningless to the two Slayers.
"What is it?" Colleen asked.
Giles picked one up as well. "Well, discs, I wouldn't guess. But of what..." he trailed off, reading the marker, "Oh my..."
The Slayers watched him expectantly as he sifted through the other discs, numbering twenty-three in total. "And?"
"Oh, sorry," Giles apologized distractedly, "It was... Ahem. This is a collection of tomes thought lost forever. Most of the documents the original council sought after for years..."
He spread all the discs, the thin plastic cases clattering on the bed, "They're all right here..."
And when he turned, his eyes were little moist, and a half smile adorned his features.
"This won't be forgotten, Wesley Wyndam-Pryce," Giles whispered to no one, then to the girls, "Come on, we have books to read."
--
Spike slowly turned in place, taking in the compound.
Then he did it again.
"A bloody apartment building..." he said, slightly impressed.
Willow smiled at him. "The new council does things right. We've got smaller footholds all around the world, but this is the heart of the whole thing."
"I expect you to have overseen the protective field," Illyria commented to Willow, putting a hand forward, "Do you use the scythe as a condensor for the energies?"
Willow blinked. "Uh, what?"
"A spell of this magnitude would require a focal point," Illyria noted, touching the ground, "I am not daft in the ways of Arcanum."
The redhead furrowed her brow. "Yeah, but... how did you know about that?"
Spike looked over, and for the tiniest of moments, Illyria looked... different. It was hard to place what flickered across her eyes.
"It..." the demon goddess paused, "It is elementary to detect. Your magic is strong, but crude. That artifact calls out as a beacon."
Willow frowned again. "If you're from before Slayers, doesn't that mean you're from before the scythe too?"
And there that fleeting thing was again, sparking through Illyria's gaze. Slightly, she turned her face away, and quickly added, "I have read through many tomes, Mage. I know of this world."
And the Spike knew what it was he saw.
She was embarrassed.
--
"C'mon, B, aren't you gonna talk to him?"
Buffy looked away from the punching bag, which was ever the worse for wear. "What?"
Faith came around behind it, holding it steady. Buffy resumed punching for a moment, a little dust falling from the ceiling of the basement. "Well?" Faith asked.
"Look," the blonde sighed, pushing some loose hair out of the way, "I don't wanna talk about this. Just hold the bag."
Faith frowned. She held the bag anyway, though.
--
Spike sipped on his beer impatiently. This was not the time for inaction. He should be out in the field, in L.A., looking for the missing members of their team. Hell, he actually had a team for once. He owed it to them.
Willow had taken Illyria into another room, apparently with the purpose of seeing if she could help with the spells, and ancient lore that protected the building. Spike, on the other hand, was told he could have whatever he wanted out of the fridge.
It felt like a waste, however he looked at it.
More times than once, he felt like throwing the bottle against the wall and dashing to where he could hear Buffy below them. There were only a handful of people in the building, and he could tell those punches anywhere.
But yet he sat, reading the label on the mediocre-quality beer the fridge held. He was pretty sure he could guess its owner in one.
"You're alive!" A voice came from the doorway, "And you're drinking my beer!"
Spike almost grinned as he looked up to see Xander Harris staring at him in open shock. "You could afford better, mate."
Xander made an emphatically questioning gesture and sat down. "I heard you were back, but I had to see it to believe it."
Spike shot a look at his false eye. It was a good match.
"Though I guess you could be a cardboard cutout as far as I know," he smiled, tapping his eye, something that made Spike want to cringe for some reason.
"Nope," Spike sighed, "Thick as ever."
Xander's smile took a moment off, and the whole look fell apart. "Yeah. I can figure. Look, I just wanted to say... I'm glad you're not dead."
Spike stopped in mid-swig to look at the other man. A questioning glance was all that was required.
"Yeah, we never got along, but... You gave your life for the right reasons. I can appreciate that."
The beer came down, and Spike pulled out another and thrust it at Xander. "Hollow sacrifice," Spike thumped his chest.
Xander shrugged. "You didn't know that," he noted, drinking some beer, "I wish we could get back everyone we lost, but this's a start."
Spike lifted his bottle in toast. "I'll drink to that. Thanks."
And they drank.
--
Willow had no way to tell, but she thought Illyria was acting strangely. She seemed both eager to get the tour of the magics done with, and incredibly interested in all of it. Strangest of all was her reluctance to make any kind of eye contact.
Willow didn't press the issue, however, as the confusion eye contact evoked was an uncomfortable addition to looking into those cold blue saucers.
"Where do you keep the scythe?"
Willow grimaced. "Sorry, that's a secret. I'm the only one who knows where it is," she lied. Buffy, Giles, and Xander all had that knowledge, but it was policy not to reveal that fact.
"Wait!" Willow exclaimed, pointing a finger at Illyria as they stopped in the middle of a hallway, "You said you could sense it!"
Illyria turned at the exclamation, and their eyes locked for a long moment. Soon, the demoness's eyes began to dart, as though searching for a forgotten excuse.
"Why are you..." Willow trailed off as some kind of realization tried to crawl out of her brain.
Illyria suddenly turned away, staring angrily out the window. "You work some manner of sorcery on me, Mage, and I fail to appreciate it."
Willow furrowed her brow further. Illyria was silhouetted against the window, the dark night sky stark against her pale flesh. The contour of her profile was striking, and It made Willow stumble over something in her mind.
"Wh... what are you talking about?" Willow asked, distracted with trying to piece something together.
And the blue woman looked at her, some alien realization on here face. She looked ready to flee, but something seemed to hold her there.
"Cease your toying with me!" she shouted at Willow, "You seek to destroy me in the name of the shell! It is easy to figure when the memories are read!"
In chunks, the realization fell at once, first discontiguous and overwhelming, then gradually settling into a horribly cold revelation. She should have seen it immediately. It was only through such a radical change that she dismissed the possibility subconsciously.
"Oh my god..." Willow reached forward, touching her hands to the woman's cheeks with the lightest of touches, almost afraid of the contact, but not able to stop.
"Oh god... Fred?"
The blue woman drew a breath in sharply and pushed Willow away sharply, almost toppling her. "No!" Illyria exclaimed with unprecedented fury.
Willow knitted her brow, willing an understanding that refused to come. This was why they hadn't mentioned Fred. Willow had assumed the other girl missing, and had failed to see her right in front of her eyes. It was how she knew about the scythe; Willow often informed Fred of her spells, and Fred did the same with her experiments. They had become something of pen pals over the past year... and then it had stopped.
"You..." Willow said with increasing mistrust, "You're not her, are you?"
Illyria had backed into the shadows, only her chilling face visible in the moonlight. "I am as I claimed to be, Mage. I am an old one, lords of this land from a time unremembered."
"But... what happened to..." Willow said slowly, not liking where this was going.
Illyria stepped forward, arms open in a gesture of non-violence. "The shell's soul, her essence, is lost to us, destroyed in my reincarnation. There is only Illyria in this carcass, Mage. What would you do to me in response?"
Willow stumbled backwards, leaning against a windowsill to not fall. "You... you killed her?"
For a moment, Illyria seemed to consider what she would say, and then she swooped forward, closing half of the distance between them. "Yes! In my return to your world, she was melted from inside like the scum humans are! I destroyed your comrade! What will you do in return? Hurry, Mage! Make your choice!"
Disgust raged through Willow, and she felt the twinges of hatred biting at her mind. Her eyes raced, trying to land anywhere but on those pools of decay, but always failing. The only thing she could think of was Fred, sweet and kind and smiling and brilliant, lending a needed light to a dark place.
And now that light was denied forever.
Willow shook for a moment, and red energies crackled between her hands. Illyria stood fast, something pitiful in her eyes. For a moment, green met blue, and Willow suddenly blinked, realization clearing just enough of her mind.
"No," Willow stated, "I can't do it... I shouldn't."
"Fool!" Illyria shouted, "You cannot tell your enemy from your friend?"
Willow breathed deeply. "No, I really can't. How about you?"
Falling forward onto Willow, the blue demoness sucked air in sharply and whispered, "I wish I could not..."