" I think I'm controlling the Heart."
Tara frowned and stared down at her hands. Not the reaction Willow was hoping for. Then again, why would she want her tainted energy in this body when she could have the real thing? The old Willow.
Slender fingers began to gently play with her own, circling and stroking her hands as the pale brow furrowed in concentration. As if she was reading her palm, but no. She knew this face. Tara was trying to find a way to tell her something important. Working toward the explanation that would cause Willow the least pain. She felt her heart break at the familiar sight. This miracle that kept recreating itself over and over with every second. Tara alive. And the new thing. Hope.
"S-so you're like., a r-really powerful, um, witch?" the blonde raised her eyes tentatively to meet Willow's. "I mean, in theuh, the f-future?" There was no smile. And she remembered their first argument before Glory. Tara's fear that Willow was growing too powerful. A fear that had proved to be well-founded. She grimaced at the memory. Not a shining moment in the history of Willow Rosenburg. Had it started this early? Tara's fears about her magic use?
Her forehead tightened as she tried to form her response. Carefully. But she couldn't trust her mouth and brain to cooperate so she resigned herself to a meaningful nod. When she finally found the strength to look up Tara was biting her lip, staring out the window at the night sky with an unreadable expression.
"So, um, that's g-good right? Cause that's wh-what you, uhI meanthat's what you w-wanted." The blonde closed her eyes painfully around the last word and turned back to her.
Willow found that she couldn't meet those deep blue eyes and looked instead to their entwined hands. The long, slender fingers that tapered at the tips. Witch fingers' she had read somewhere once. A rueful smile played over her lips at the accurate description. Tara was the real witch. She had always understood implicitly about balance. Things that Willow had been forced to learn in one painful, destructive lesson after another.
"It's what I thought I wantedyou know, the big magic."
Tara winced and nodded solemnly before looking down at their hands. "But 't-terrible things.'" It wasn't a question and Willow didn't attempt an answer. Just nodded. There was a long silence that was finally broken by Tara's long inhale.
"So, if you're, um, controlling this d-device why don't you just go b-back?" Suddenly blue eyes held her own, calm and clear and deep. "To me?" As tears clouded Willow's vision, the features before her blurred and blended into an impressionistic watercolor of blues and peach, ash blonde and white.
There was so much she needed to tell her. She wanted to scream it all in a warning. To write it on the walls, tattoo it on pale skin so that it was never forgotten or ignored. But she couldn't. Because she didn't know enough yet. And if she had changed things so radically it wouldn't matter anyway. It never had before. Things tended to get worse in Sunnydale. Not better.
"Tara I" She croaked and pawed clumsily at her eyes to wipe the tears from her cheeks and realized that she didn't have a voice to give herself away anyway. Cool fingers cupped her face gently and she looked up to find tear-filled eyes studying her carefully. Tara knew. Had probably known for some time. Willow couldn't even protect her from the terrible knowledge of her own death.
"I'm s-so sorry." Strong hands held her face as Tara's lips pressed against her eyelids, against the cool wet of the tears on her cheek. A loud moan of a sob ripped through her and she felt the magic shift within her. Her first impulse was to react against it with equal force, but she was stopped by the gentle touch of Tara's mouth whispering against her forehead.
No. This isfighting back with magic is not of the good here. Tara knows something. She knew it before you even got here becausethe books. Just let her find a way to tell you.to tell herself.
Listen to Tara. Let her
Willing her eyes open, she steadied herself around the woman in front of her. Forced everything within her to circle Tara, making her the new center of the universe.
Somehow they found each other through the magic and the grief. The wet heat of Tara's mouth was on hers, salty with tears and sweet and her grief-filled moan was transformed into an utterance of total desperation and longing. "Tara I can't lose you again," she managed between kisses and sobs. And then pulled away. They needed to research this problem. To find a way for her to harness the Heart's power and stay here with Tara. That was the important thing because her rational brain kept arguing that she had changed the future already, but there was the stronger, deeper part of her that seemed to remember this. Knew that this had already happened. And that was impossible. She needed to know more so she could stop this terrible march to that room. "But.but it's okay. I can fix it cause if I'm all controlling"
But her love was silent., cutting her off with the light pressure of fingertips on her lips. Holding her gaze Tara carefully removed Willow's t-shirt, tracing her collarbone with eyes and shaking fingers. The redhead shivered and felt her mouth open automatically in a question against cool fingertips. She watched in awed silence as blue eyes traveled over her body, studying her with cautious intensity. The fingertips were gone and she felt the cutting elastic of her bra slide away, an astonished shy smile forming on perfect ruby lips.
"I know this is probably not such a b-big, um, deal to you Willow, but" then that lopsided smile and her eyes asking a silent azure question. Willow wasn't sure what the question was, but she knew the answer. She nodded and felt timid fingers brush her right breast, felt the pull of Tara echo through every part of her gently taking charge of her. Closing her eyes, parting her lips with that light touch. "this is all" soft lips grazed her own. "I ever wanted." And then feathery press of lips and tongue and fingers on her skin pushing back the magic and the future. Making the now again in this room as Tara felt her way across and through Willow. It had been all about the desperate, heated density of reunion before in that other room, but this was moments that stretched into a long, liquid exploration of a start.
Let Tara lead the way.
There was a burst of light and she opened her eyes to see the room erupt in a shower of tiny floating stars. Fairy lights, she thought absently as Tara's smile deepened, her eyes dancing along with the tiny flames. But only for a moment.
And the Heart's spell receded, pushed back by the molten circle of them. By Tara as she pulled her own shirt over her head, her eyes turning that dark new moon blue.
"Tara this is," she began in a hoarse whisper, but was silenced by the gentle, insistent press of Tara's mouth on her own. And then lips soft and winged against her ear making her arch into a soft hand, her body trying to take flight.
"this is the big magic "
Yes.
****
"Dawn!"
All she could think in the moment she heard the scream of her name was this is what it feels like to be an astronaut. Until her body fell from weightlessness into a heap on the unforgiving cemetery turf. Which Willow would have told her was a great lesson in gravity, but at this moment it was a hard lesson. And there was something harder under her. Hard and cold.
A sound like the tearing of metal brought her back to the moment. Why were things suddenly moving so fast? Her eyes traveled up what looked like two trunks of a red-barked tree and understood with sudden terror what the sound was. The demon above her was screaming as it clawed at a wooden stake protruding from its eye. It wasenormous. If this was Vra'al there was no exaggeration and very probably no hope for them. He was at least fifteen feet tall, stretching above her like a building.
The familiar thud and grunts of hand-to-hand combat brought her head around. Faith was struggling with two smaller demons that were covered in dull metallic scales. Battling to reach Dawn where she still lay on the ground. And Faith had no weapon.
"Dawn run!" Faith screamed as she blocked a terrible blow that brought her to her knees. But Dawn couldn't move, frozen to the spot by the certain knowledge that the Slayer was going to die if she ran. They were too much for her and there were more coming, she could seem their strange lurching forms moving toward the clearing through the headstones and crypts. Struggling to reach her feet she felt the hard thing beneath her bite into her leg with stinging heat. The sword. She began to cry with relief as she struggled to free it from her own weight. But she didn't know how to use it.
Rolling the grip in her hands she watched Faith complete a complicated series of kicks to bring herself between the demons and Dawn. Sucking in a deep breath Dawn closed her eyes and let go of all her fantasies of being the hero. She tossed the sword as hard as she could in Faith's general direction and opened her eyes in time to watch the sword tilt and straighten into a silver arc heading straight for the Slayer's back.
Oh god!
"Faith!" She covered her eyes with her hands so she wouldn't have to see it.
Oh my god! I killed Faith. I killed a Slayer. I stabbed her in the back and
Another metallic scream ripped through the night.
"Nice toss D." Dawn's eyes flew open in time to watch one of the demons fall, impaled on the sword. Before it could hit the ground Faith wrenched the blade free and was whirling in a blur on the remaining demon. But there were more shadows approaching and she thought she could hear the oily flutter of leathery wings above her. There were too many.
"Run damnit!" Faith screamed again as she lunged at another demon and at the last moment defied the laws of gravity her body twisting to behead an approaching demon. Dawn knew she should run, but she couldn't. Some strange part of her brain was talking to her. Telling her that if the Slayer was going to die here someone should see it. She shouldn't die alone. And then her eyes fell on the familiar dark silhouette of Spike still pinned to the trunk of the tree. She was on her feet in a moment, crossing the distance in long strides.
Spike was struggling against the stake in his chest, his eyes wild as he surveyed the demons around them. He clawed at the wooden spike in his chest, but it was slick with blood and he couldn't seem to get any leverage, flailing against the tree as his fingers slipped over the butt of the stake. She knew she should leave him there or stake him herself for everything he had done, but they needed him now. Why did it always seem to work out that way?
"Get out of here!" he growled.
"Make me!" she yelled through tears and looked around for anything that could help, but there was nothing. Just demons and headstones. She turned back to watch his feet kick against the narrow trunk of the tree. A sudden inspiration made her drop to all fours.
"What the"
"Stand on my back," she yelled over the metallic screams around her and crawled beneath his feet. There was a moment when she was sure this was a ridiculous idea, that she had just dropped to all fours in the middle of a demon battle to be beheaded or worse. And then Spike's full weight was pressing down on her, his boots hard and cold against her spine. She gritted her teeth and felt him shift several times and then a quick, agonized yell as his weight lurched forward and off of her.
Strong hands yanked her to her feet and she found herself staring at the wound in his chest. So close. Faith must have pulled back only at the last moment. A millimeter of error and Spike would have been dust. She looked up into game face' and cringed.
Never forget he's a vampire. Xander's warning rang in her head as yellow, reptilian eyes met her own.
"Stay here," he commanded and pushed her against the tree.
"Motherfuckers!" Faith's battle cry was primal. "You are so gonna fucking die!" The Dark Slayer, smiling and covered in blood, ducked and blocked a blow from one demon before whirling with inhuman speed to decapitate another. And the sword was suddenly, impossibly in her other hand, jerking back to impale a third as she landed a solid kick to the head of another.
"Bloody hell," Spike murmured appreciatively and the teenager just nodded. This was so not Buffy. Buffy was elegant and choreographed when she fought. Even when she was slaying she seemed to be following some kind of rulebook on proper behavior, fighting with perfect posture. Hitting with robotic precision. But Faith waswild. Unrestrained.
Too bad you can't get extra credit for PSAT vocab words used in the heat of battle.
And that was the strange thing because for the heat of battle it was awfully quiet. The only sounds were Faith's incessant yells and the clang and thud of the sword. The demons, for all their apparent organization didn't seem to be saying a thing.
What's up with that?
With a low growl Spike launched himself at a demon bearing down on them. As they began to trade blows, Dawn again searched for anything that might help. There had been an axe. Where was it?
As her eyes scanned the surreal scene before her she was inevitably drawn to the enormous figure of the demon who had grabbed her in the first place. He stood still at the far edge of the clearing with his arms crossed and the skin of his head seemed to be alive, shifting and changing. She squinted into the darkness and realized with a gasp what she was seeing. His skin wasn't moving, it was covered in what looked like giant reptilian bats. Their clawed hands worked at his wound, pulling at the stake, black tongues licking away the blood.
"Ew!" She looked away quickly, her eyes landing on the silver glint of the axe blade in the grass. It was easily fifteen yards away through the thick of the battle. She heard Faith's eerie howl again and wondered if the Slayer could stop herself if Dawn got in the way. Spike was struggling with another demon to her right and losing. His only weapon the blood-covered stake. She had no choice. But she couldn't seem to move.
cause, hello! You are not a Slayer. You are just some stupid girl who used to be a Key and you are going to get very dead if you go out there.
But Faith's going to die
Inhaling deeply she searched for anything to calm her, wishing suddenly that she knew a prayer. Any kind of prayer. Buddhist, Jewish, Wiccan, whatever. But she didn't. All she knew were the few spells that Tara had taught her and that disturbing rhyming thing she had learned from her grandmother --- "Now I lay me down to sleep" --- which ended up in a scary place so big no to that.
But Tara. The image of the smiling blonde brought a smile to her face. And somehow, impossibly, in the middle of a raging battle she felt calm. Maybe she did know a prayer after all.
It took her almost thirty seconds to pick her way around the edge of the fray. Ducking and sometimes crawling and generally trying to stay as invisible as possible. She was used to that — the invisible thing — it was only when she tried to be noticed that she got into trouble.
She had to crawl the last ten feet ducking as a demon arm as it flew past her head to land with a thud near her. Well, that could be a weapon if she really needed one. Butyuck.
The wooden handle of the axe was so close. Crawling quickly she held it's slick grip in her hands and leaned back on her heels. There were too many demons between her and Spike now. A hissing sound to her right brought her to her feet. A demon and it was too close now for her to run. She remembered Faith's instructions and swung. Maybe she could hit something. Anything. An arm or a leg and the Slayer could help her. But the axe met no resistance. She had missed. It's weight and momentum swept her around in a dizzying off-balance twirl until it connected with somethinghard. The impact jarring her with such severity that she yelped in pain. The axe was torn from her grasp as the demon fell to earth with the blade buried in its side.
Dawn rubbed her hands on her jeans trying to wipe away some of the pain and numbness. Her hands felt as if they had been stungby a really big bee. The demon was still twitching on the ground, but he didn't seem too dangerous so she closed her eyes and gripped the handle to free the blade. It wouldn't budge, caught on metallic scales. Blowing her hair out of her face she tugged again and felt it jerk free.
"D! Down now!" Without bothering to breathe, Dawn dropped. She felt as much as heard the whisper of metal slip past her left ear. Something very heavy fell over her pinning the axe underneath her body.
It took her a few seconds to free herself from the demon's weight. As she pulled herself free she heard Faith's howl again, but it wasn't a battle cry this time. It was pain. She turned to see the Slayer's face twisted in agony, one hand covering a terrible gash in her left shoulder.
"Okay, now I'm pissed," she hissed and struck out with a roundhouse that sent one demon flying into another.
"Faith!" Dawn screamed and tossed the axe, careful this time to throw it in a high arc, handle down. As she watched its flight, mesmerized by its lazy progress, time seemed to slow. The Slayer's eyes swept quickly over the battlefield and an evil smile crossed her features. With a wink for Dawn time sped up again. Faith didn't seem to even make contact with the axe handle, lunging and rolling to redirect its path, adding her own energy to hurl it sideways through the necks of two demons and halfway through a third.
Dawn wanted to scream with joy, but Faith was already fighting another demon, her crippled arm held against her body. The wound was terrible. Dawn could see bone through the streaming blood and her stomach clenched violently, but the Slayer defied her own injury as she rolled to free the sword and lunged to kill a demon that had crept up behind Dawn. Faith stood before her now, taking in the overwhelming number of the demons. There seemed to be an endless supply of them as they moved to encircle the two women. For every one they killed another took its place.
She felt something warm trickle down the side of her right hand and noticed with growing detachment that her shirt sleeve was sliced in a line across her shoulder. The axe must have cut me when I fell on it, she thought absently and felt Faith take her hand in her own, their blood mingling as she squeezed gently.
Guess that means we're blood sisters.
Faith turned to Dawn finally with a sad smile.
"See ya Half Pint." Another wink and she streaked away, her inhuman howl causing a ripple of agitation in the crowd of demons. The sword blade swinging in mad, fierce arcs. Dawn looked toward the axe, but it was too far away. Too many demons between her decidedly non-Slayer body and the weapon. Another hiss beside her and she knew it was over. The distance between herself and Faith was too large and the Slayer was currently overwhelmed by four demons. She put her fists up and wondered how it was going to feel when the hard scales hit her.
Duh, it's going to hurt. A lot.
There was a terrible sharp pain and pressure in her neck and strong hands holding her still. The world swam before her eyes and her knees gave way, but she was held upright.
Everything was suddenly silent. She worried that she had gone deaf, but there was still the sound of the Slayer grunting as she decapitated another demon before slowly winding down to take in the eerie scene. The demons, the trees, everything had gone completely still.
"I'll drain her dry before you wankers can take a step," Spike growled close to her ear. "There won't be enough blood left to open a portal for a doormouse much less you and your fan club."
There was a moment of sheer terror but it passed and Dawn grew very calm in the vampire's grip. Everything seemed so clear, her vision tunneling down to one thing — Faith. As she hung limp in the vampire's arms she felt as if a connection was opening between herself and the Slayer. Like a portalsort of. She watched dark eyes scan the scene, brows furrowing and felt it. Saw it. The world of the cemetery was suddenly crisp, everything was brighter and more clearly defined. But it wasn't just vision, she could feel the demons around her like tactile colors that were different than the trees and the cold stones. Could feel the sword, weightless in the Slayer's grip, like an extension of her arm.
And suddenly she was just Dawn again. Watching the Slayer as she held the shining blade at the proper angle, ready to strike. She saw the wounds, scores of them deep and jagged. A deep cut on the Faith's forehead that caused her to constantly wipe at her eye to clear her vision. When those eyes reached Dawn she saw the flash of fury and something else. Terror. For her.
She started to cry immediately, but not because of sadness. It was joy, overwhelming joy. Faith — cold, hard, tough girl Faith — actually cared whether she died or lived. And not because she was a fucking Key.
It's okay. It's okay. He's not going to hurt me. Well, he already hurt me, but not that bad. It's okay, it's going to be okay
She realized it was Tara's voice she was hearing over and over again in her mind. A mantra for calm. But it wasn't for her.
Faith's forehead tightened in confusion as she stared at the teenager. Then everything justopened. The space between herself and Faith. And she was hit with all of it at once. Images and pieces of a different life. A life full of fear and fury and the constant always threat of violence from everyone. And worse, something terrible and all-too familiar. Desperate loneliness. She gasped and heard an answering intake of breath from Faith.
"Slayer?" Spike mumbled into the teenager's neck. Faith composed herself in an instant and nodded with a grimace before turning to back toward them slowly.
"You would eat a thing as valuable as the Key?" the demon asked in a low, booming voice.
"She's not a thing' you uglyass excuse for a"
"You bet your ass I would," Spike interjected and Dawn shuddered as his teeth grazed the wound on her neck. "Tasty lil' bird like this is just too good to pass up."
She heard Faith's deep growl, but the Slayer held firm.
" The Heart is mine, Slayer. It was stolen from me and I will have it returned. You will release it and the Key to me by dawn or"
"Whatever," Faith rolled her eyes and turned her back on the demon horde. "A hell god couldn't pull it off, but One-eyed Jack here thinks he's gonna take the Key from a Slayer." She shook her head and walked behind them. "Call me when someone buys you a fucking clue."
Dawn felt the earth fall away again as Spike swept her into his arms. Everything kept shifting in dizzying waves, but she kept her focus on the dark form of the Slayer up ahead and felt everything else justfade away.