Part Four

The first few days that Buffy spent in her new home in San Francisco, she hid out within the limitations of her new bedroom in an evidently worthless attempt at avoiding her new situation. So she scarcely left the small room and spent infinite hours organizing and reorganizing her possessions into some form familiar to her - her own way of regaining some continuity in her life since it had been turned upside down once again. Eventually she gave up the ridiculous task and gathered up the courage to face her unknown cousins.

Buffy did not want to admit to how panicky she was about her recent circumstances; after all she could count on one hand the amount of time that she had spent in her elder cousins company before her mother had died. She could not help but believe; deep down, that she was an unnecessary nuisance - an encumbrance to her family. If only she had been allowed to remain with her brother back in LA, at least then things would have been semi-normal and there would be none of these malevolent qualms arising.

Ultimately she ventured downstairs only to find that her cousins were all out somewhere, apparently at their respective jobs and assorted other commitments. Wandering into the kitchen she found that Piper had left her a note - attached to the large white refrigerator - telling her to help herself to lunch and that they were going to sit down and discuss the circumstances they were all in and what they were going to do about it when they had all returned to the manor.

Reflecting upon her next move with regards to her free day, Buffy was apprehensive when the front door bell rang out unexpectedly. Since Piper's carefully written note had told her nothing about any visitors that may be arriving and since she was still new to the house and area, Buffy was a little nervous about answering the door. Pushing the futile emotions aside and answered it with a composed and controlled manor. Upon opening it she found a redheaded teenaged girl standing there.

"Hi," the girl said bubbly. "I'm Willow Rosenberg - from next door. Your - uh - cousin Prue suggested that I stop by and get to know you since you'll be attending the same high school as me."

"Oh - uh - hi."

Willow looked slightly embarrassed, "They never mentioned me, did they?"

"Well, they might have - if I hadn't spent all of my time hiding up in my room," Buffy confessed. Sensing that the redhead was no threat, that in fact she had a gentle aura; Buffy stepped back out of the way. "Do you want to come in?"

"Sure," Willow answered as she entered her neighbor's home for the first time ever with only a slight case of trepidation.

Drusilla circumspectly crept around the pitch-black passageways of the copious estate that The Master had brought them to, in an endeavor to avoid her daddy and his monstrously abominably violent temper. She knew why her daddy was like this and it was all the mean old Master's fault. If he had not dragged them away from America, mommy and their happy home, then everything would be all right.

Hearing her daddy's intonation echoing down the corridor from nearby, Dru stopped and then all of a sudden doubled back the way that she had come. She had more or less returned to the suite that she and Spike had been sharing, when her head began to swim and stars began to speak to her. As she sank down to the cold stone floor her mind was beleaguered with a barrage of whispered words and images, the most predominant of which was about daddy and the Gem of Amara.

She was still in her position on the floor ten minutes later when Spike stumbled across her. Concerned for his mate's welfare he kneeled down next to her, "Dru? Honey?"

"Spike," Dru answered, her expression never changing from one of dreaminess. "I saw it. Daddy was holding it in his hands and it was the most beautiful thing that I have ever seen."

"What are you taking about?" Spike asked wondering what Peaches had been holding that was so breathtaking - although he could envisage.

"My vision - the stars."

Spike pulled her into his arms and kissed her almost imperceptibly on the forehead, "Tell me what you saw."

"The Gem of Amara," she whispered to him elatedly.

Spike coughed roughly at Dru's news, "Peaches has the gem?"

"He will soon."

"Oh fan-bloody-tastic," Spike muttered sardonically. Every single vampire on the face of the earth - including himself - had been searching for their equivalent of the holy grail for centuries and now for some unknown reason it looked like Peaches was about to go down in history as the next recipient and the first nightwalker to daywalk since it's original owner.

"When daddy gets his gem we can all go home and mommy will be there," Dru rambled on excitedly. "Then daddy will be happy again and everything will be all right once more."

Spike tried hard not to gag at Dru's sentiment and although Peaches may have a better attitude around Fluffy, he didn't need or want the spoiled teenaged bitch around unless he had too.

Taking his silence as an agreement to her thoughts on the matter, Dru stood up slowly and offered Spike her fragile hand. "Come now, my Spike. It is time for a celebration."

Spike stood himself up, took hold of her offered hand and let her lead him into their bedroom, all without muttering a single word of acceptance or rejection.

After hurriedly checking on his younger charge and finding Buffy gossiping and giggling away with some redhead, Giles headed to Los Angeles to check on how Oz was coping alone. Arriving at Joyce's home - an exceedingly excruciating experience under the circumstances - he found the place to be somewhat trashed, with piles of dirty clothes and dishes scattered around the once pristine living room. Orbing to the location of the wayward witch, Giles found him lying asleep on his bed as though he had not a care in the world.

"Daniel Peter, wake up," Giles said rocking the mattress that the teenager was laying upon.

"Go away," Oz murmured through his pillow at Giles, he just wasn't ready to be awoken yet.

Giles shook his head and orbed back downstairs and started to clean what had once been an immaculate room. He had almost finished the task when Oz finally surfaced and came downstairs, wearing nothing but a pair of striped cotton boxers.

"Hey!"

The cleaning stopped as Giles stared at the young man who was the closest he had ever come to having a son of his own. "Are you all right? Do you need medical attention?"

"No. Why?"

Giles pointed to remaining mess that surrounded him, "Why else would the house be in such a state?"

Oz simply shrugged, "Buffy and mom did all the cleaning."

"You are going to have to do it from now on," Giles chided softly. "It's your responsibility now."

"Sure," Oz replied casually.

Giles turned his full attention to him, "If you do not do this, then most likely Buffy will forsake her own destiny in order to return here to take care of *you*. You do not want that on your conscience, do you?"

"No," Oz answered straightforwardly. "I promise I'll shape up."

"Excellent," Giles told him with an intimidating smirk. "Let's begin by finishing up the cleaning."

When the Charmed Ones at long last returned to the manor from their respective activities, they found their obstinate cousin laughing and gossiping with their redheaded neighbor. It was unquestionably more than they had hoped for when they had prearranged the meeting between the two. Leaving the two teenagers to carry on with whatever they were doing, the three witches walked into the kitchen and sat down at the plain wooden kitchen table that had been there since the home had belonged to their grandmother. They simply sat there eating, drinking and gossiping about their individual love lives until they heard the front door close and Buffy materialized somewhat grudgingly in the doorway.

"Hi," she said visibly nervous, stepping from foot to foot.

"Hey," Phoebe replied smiling.

"Why don't you come over here and sit down and we'll begin our discussion," Prue suggested.

All of their eyes remained upon Buffy as she took a seat next to Piper and close to the door. With patience they waited until she was settled in the seat and staring back at them - admittedly a lot more uncertainly - before the first of them spoke.

"I think that we should lay down some ground rules - to make all of our lives simpler while you live here," Prue said taking charge of the situation.

Buffy cocked her head to the side staring at her eldest cousin with suspicion, "What sort of rules?"

Buffy was shocked; she had on no account before had to deal with rules such as curfews and whom she could date. How would she cope under such restrictions? Besides when Angelus returned - if he ever did, since the possibility grew more unlikely each with each day passed - how would she explain the presence of a Master vampire in her life?

Prue cleared her throat as she tried to remember the restrictions that had been placed upon her and her sisters growing up. "Like doing your homework before dinner and such."

Phoebe rolled her eyes at her older sibling, "Prue all kids know that - it's a no-brainer. What we should be discussing is Buffy's magickal training."

"Yeah," Buffy agreed her eyes lighting up with interest at the mention of magick. It had been a hell of a long time since she'd had even the slightest interest in it, maybe it was time to put her secret life back on track.

"Hang on a minute here," Piper interrupted them, ever the practical one. "Before we take this step I think we need to confer with Leo and Giles. After all they would have a better idea of where we need to go with the training and how far - for both ourselves and Buffy's protection."

Prue nodded after some hesitation, "Agreed."

"Fine," Phoebe added.

Sighing Buffy stood up only to be stopped by Prue. "Where do you think you are going? We haven't finished our talk yet."

"What now?" Buffy whined in return. Wasn't the words that they had exchanged enough already? It was after all more words, more conversation than they had exchanged in previous years.

Piper spoke up, "Tomorrow morning, Prue is going to take you down to the local high school and enroll you in classes. Don't pull that face at me, Buffy. It won't be so bad, Willow goes there and she'll show you around. Then Phoebe will take you to shop for school supplies - and only school supplies, Pheebs. And hopefully by tomorrow night we should be able to sit down and discuss where to go with the magic training. Anything you would like to add?"

"Oh freakin' joy."

TBC...