Part 14

Dawn slowly crossed the room towards the door, shooting Buffy a questioning look as she went.  Buffy nodded to her and gave the younger girl a reassuring smile.  Dawn exited the room closing the door behind her.

Buffy turned to Meg, her eyes blazing, and said, "All deals are off.  You just put my sister in jeopardy.  She could have died just then."

"Buffy, please, calm down for just a moment," said Meg, picking up the knife that she had thrown at Dawn.  She walked past Buffy and placed it on the table near the young woman, and then continued across the room, with her back to Buffy.

"Buffy, I want you to pick up that knife and throw it at me," she continued.

"Gladly," said Buffy picking up the knife.  Quickly she spun around and threw it at Meg.

The knife flew across the room, stopped short at Meg's back, flipped, flew back towards Buffy, stopped short in front of her, and then clattered to the ground.

"Now, will you believe that I would never willingly put your sister in danger?" asked Meg.

"Wow," said Buffy, "Is Dawnie going to be able to do that?"

"That and more, if you'll allow it," said Meg.  "She is a very powerful being.  The full extent of her power is unknown, but it is up to us to help her harness it." 

"I… I'm sorry I freaked out so much," said Buffy a little sheepishly.

"To be honest, Buffy, I expected it.  And I would have been disappointed if you had allowed me to hurl a knife at your sister without it," laughed Meg.  "Now why don't you go out there and try and pull Dawn down off of the cloud I am sure she is on, and send Tara in here please."

"Sure thing Prof.," Buffy said, pausing for a moment then catching her error continued, "Sure thing Meg."

Buffy returned to the Magic Box proper and whispered in Tara's ear. 

Tara flashed her a nervous grin as she got up and went into the training room.

"You should have seen it Xander," said Dawn in an excited voice.  "She threw a knife at me and I stopped it."

"You mean Buffy stopped it for you," said Anya in a condescending voice.  "Little children shouldn't play with sharp objects."

"Anya," said Dawn in an annoyed voice, "Are you going to remember any time soon that I am 16 years old?"

"Of course you are," said Anya absently as she patted Dawn on the head.

Rolling her eyes in resignation, Dawn turned back towards Xander.  "So anyhow, she threw this knife at me, and I managed to stop it.  But the freaky thing is I had no clue I was doing it.  Isn't that just the greatest?" she squealed.

"Geez, Buff, what did the two of you do to her in there, she's been higher than a kite since she came out?" asked Xander.

"Well, pretty much it's like she said.  Meg threw a knife at Dawn, and Dawn stopped it.  With her mind."

"With her mind?" asked Giles joining the conversation.  "Amazing.  Dawn, do you think you could do it again?"

"Well, I don't know, I don't know how I did it the first time.  Ow!!!," she exclaimed rubbing the back of her head.  She turned to see a packet of rattlesnake rattles on the floor.

"No, the Niblet can't do it again," said Spike, bending to retrieve the item that he had thrown as Dawn shot him a dirty look.  "Well at least not now," he amended.  The last thing he wanted was to jazz off Dawn or Buffy.

"Thanks so much for the demonstration Spike," said Giles sarcastically.

"Yeah," said Willow, indignant on Dawn's behalf.  "How about if we throw a stake at you and see if Dawn can stop that!

"Calm down Red," said Spike.  "Don't get all huffy on me, I just wanted Little Bit here to realize that just because it happened once, doesn't mean it's going to happen again."

The group began to quarrel amongst themselves in a good-natured way when the door opened and out walked Tara.  The girl's face shone as if she had a light burning inside of her.

"Xander, Meg would like to see you," was all she said as she went over to the table to sit down.