Equinoxium: Chapter 18
by Lisette
Legalese: See Chapter 1 for disclaimers and ratings.
Groaning softly, Buffy felt awareness seep back into her leadened body to the pulse of her aching head. All at once she felt the press of a soft mattress beneath her, the whisper of a cold breeze against her chilled skin, and the heavy weight of cold steel against her slender wrists and ankles as the fog began to ease back from her muddied thoughts. Her eyelids felt as though they were weighed down by bags of grainy sand, pressing dark lashes against her cheeks as they locked her in her dark prison - a prison that echoed with the sounds of feet off of stone, that rattled with labored breaths, and which stank of a foulness that at once clogged her nostrils and caused her heart to begin hammering in her chest. She knew this rank smell just as surely as she recognized the harsh, guttural voices that spoke in a language that caused the fine hairs on her arms to prickle and stand on end - and with this realization came a blinding clarity that made her wish that consciousness had never come.
Breath catching in her throat, Buffy now welcomed the darkness that temporarily kept the world at bay as she strained limbs that were heavy and unresponsive, leaving her naught but her thoughts to keep her company. She remembered her abduction with a disturbing clarity, yet it was the voyage afterwards that was shrouded in hazy memory. There was much darkness and quiet with vague recollections of a dark horse, lands bathed in shadow, the river Anduin and steep cliffs that bordered the Great River, and a nauseating liquid that had been forced down her throat - a liquid that burned and burbled in her stomach, causing her body to heave uselessly against the foul drink even as it served to ease the bitter pangs of hunger. Yet none of those shrouded memories served to tell her how in the hell she was going to get herself out of this one.
Buffy forced her muscles to relax as she slowly pried her lids apart - and instantly wished she hadn't as the flickering light of nearby torches seared her blurry vision, causing her to instinctively jerk her head to the side as her lashes once more fell against her cheeks. Groaning as the pain in her head flared with this small movement, she vaguely heard the murmur of a deep voice before she sensed movement beside her, a warm, gentle hand lifting her head as a cup was pressed against her lips.
"Drink deep," the melodious voice commanded as Buffy recoiled against the touch, memories of the bitter drink flashing before her as she pursed her lips against the cool liquid that sloshed against her chapped lips. "Drink," the familiar voice repeated, the gentle tones becoming hard and demanding as fingers tangled in her long hair, causing a soft moan of pain to part her lips and allowing the liquid to flood her mouth. Yet instead of the vile drink that had been forced upon her in past hours, days or weeks, a wave of cool, fresh water cascaded down her throat, simultaneously soothing parched skin as it wrestled with the air that was reflexively drawn with the liquid, causing her numbed body to shake as she choked, her eyes flying open to see a darkened room and the impassive face of Vashnak looming above her. Coughing to clear her lungs of the water, Buffy glared at the dark-haired creature as she twisted her head from his punishing grip, only to have it fall back upon the soft mattress and roll to the side, as though it operated under a control that was separate from her own.
Grimacing at the lingering effects of whatever had been used upon her, Buffy was reminded of her mom's warnings against drug use and her promises that sampling would only lead to bad things. Oh, if only her mother knew how right she had been. Sighing softly, Buffy turned her eyes away - thankful that she could at least do that - and took in her unfamiliar surroundings. Gone was the cave floor that she had been staked to during her previous stay with orcs, and instead she found herself lying upon an ornate bed that came with its own set of heavy manacles with a short lead. The chamber itself looked as though it had been hewed from solid rock, simple in its monastic design, with only a single door and a wide balcony to interrupt the monotony.
"Where am I?" she asked, surprising herself with this relatively small achievement as her eyes locked upon the thick, heavy drapes that hid all but a sliver of glass from view - a sliver that revealed the dark of night. A part of her also wondered how long she had been held under whatever drug Vashnak had used... and yet the greater part of her feared the answer.
"Somewhere safe," the orc-turned-elf returned, his words curt as he moved into her line of sight, his black eyes locking with her own.
"Safe?" Buffy returned, the word sounding more like a shrill laugh as she pointedly closed her eyes, doing the only thing she could in order to evade his piercing gaze. "Safe for who?"
"Safe for us all," he stated, his words softening slightly as a heavy hand fell upon her shoulder.
"Well I don't need you to keep me safe!" Buffy snapped as she wearily opened her eyes. "I need you to let me go!"
Ignoring her angry retort, Vashnak smiled thinly as he stepped towards the heavy drapes, one hand pulling back the thick coverings and allowing the bright light of the moon to wash the room in his pale beams. "We will keep you safe until the end of your days and beyond. We could do no less, for you are a gift to a dying race. To my brethren, you are our Savior - our Queen."
"No," Buffy quickly stated, the word a fierce denial as she glared at Vashnak's back, now wishing that she could meet his gaze if for no other reason then to make him turn away beneath the weight of her anger. "No, what I am is the person that's going to-" she began, her threat forgotten as she heard the door behind Vashnak swing open, her already frazzled senses singing their warnings as three lumbering orcs limped into view in their awkward gait, their black eyes flickering towards her. Instinctively, the slayer found herself recoiling as much as her leadened body would allow, everything within her desperately seeking to draw away from something that was so foul and so wrong. It didn't matter how many times she encountered orcs in this world, for each time she was reminded that they were a race that was created out of pain, torture, and darkness - some evil bastard twisting a few poor souls that had once been pure and perfect so that it created something that was altogether the opposite of everything that was an elf... and now her blood was somehow working to fix that evil act in the most vile of ways.
"You have nothing to fear," Vashnak stated, his words soft as he mistakenly attributed her drawn features to fear of the three orcs that clambered before her. "They will not harm you," he assured as he returned to her bedside, the orcs lingering beside him. "To them, you have become even greater than the Master himself, someone to be cared for and revered, for while He brought only suffering and pain, you bring the promise of so much more. Just as He was our Father, you are now our Mother - the giver of life," he explained as he slipped a small dagger from the sheath at his waist before settling his lithe frame on the bed beside her, the mattress barely registering his weight - even as a heavier weight locked her protests within her aching heart.
What could she say to such a thing? What argument could she possibly use against this creature that her blood had restored? For the moment, Buffy found that there were no words that could possibly express anything. She was numb, and could only stare stupidly as Vashnak gently lifted one of her arms and stretched it towards the waiting orcs. Blinking slowly, she felt detached from this surreal moment - more an audience member than a participant as she watched an arm that surely could not have been her own, be held over the edge of the bed, an orc moving forward to hold a simple goblet beneath. Yet that fantasy of detachment was stolen from her as Buffy was reminded of her role in this twisted play as Vashnak drew the knife across tanned flesh, slicing deep into the wrist and causing a wave of fiery pain to burn down her heavy arm.
Breath choked in lungs that couldn't seem to draw breath, Buffy watched in fascinated horror as deep red blood pooled within the long cut and then spilled over, staining her skin as it streamed down the sides of her wrist until the twin trails met beneath, bonding as one until a large, fat drop of blood fell free and tumbled down into the waiting cup. For a moment, Buffy thought to open her mouth - to protest that which she couldn't prevent - only to fall silent as Vashnak's long fingers gently pushed against the sensitive skin around the wound, massaging her arm and causing the drip to transform into a steady stream of blood. Of her blood.
"The chains are merely a precautionary for the time being," Vashnak stated, interrupting Buffy's horrified thoughts as the blood slowly filled the cup. "The drug's effects will wear off in a few hours, and provided that you behave, the chains will be removed and you will be permitted the freedom of movement about this room. If you do not, the chains will be returned," he explained as he paused in his ministrations as the blood reached the rim of the cup. Turning, he accepted a clean bandage from one of the orcs and used it to tightly bind the bleeding wrist - watching as blood instantly began to soak the white linen.
"Just think of it," he murmured, his eyes narrowing upon this small stain of crimson as the other orcs bowed before backing from the room, the goblet held as though a priceless treasure before them. "We will take only one goblet of your blood each day. One goblet that will be enough to restore twenty orcs to the forms that they were always meant to have. Twenty orcs saved because of your blood... you are a gift," he repeated, finally lifting his eyes from the bandaged wound to find her eyes locked upon him. "You are a gift from the spirits of Morgoth and Sauron himself."
"No," Buffy denied as she forced her lips to move, not wanting to hear another word out of her captor's mouth as he praised the darkness that she had unwittingly carried to this world in the very blood that flooded her veins. "No, apparently I'm a gift from the Powers, the bastards," she gritted as her helplessness quickly transformed into a burning anger that was once more directed at the higher powers that had stranded her on this world.
"I do not under-"
"Of course you don't," Buffy snapped, feeling her anger gather fire as it became redirected towards the beautiful, dark-haired creature that sat beside her. "And you never will, either!" she spit, her face twisting into a mask of rage borne of betrayal. "You'll never understand because while you may look like an elf on the outside, we both know that my blood hasn't done a damn bit to change what's on the inside," she hissed, her eyes narrowing disdainfully upon him. "Your skin doesn't glow with their light and your eyes are about as shiny as coal!" she continued, watching as anger caused Vashnak's face to whiten, fine lines creasing his forehead as his lips became narrow and bloodless. "You're still twisted, you're still ugly, and you're still something that was never supposed to be!" she added, green eyes following his hand as it slowly raised as though he was preparing to backhand her for her words. Smiling grimly - a smile that felt twisted and hideous upon her face - Buffy watched this raised hand as she added the final stroke to her angry tirade, welcoming the pain and distraction the blow would bring.
"I was born to destroy things like you."
For a moment, Vashnak visibly teetered on the sharp edges of his anger before he slowly lowered his raised hand. "No," he returned, his voice soft and calm in the face of her rage. "No," he repeated as an indifferent mask slipped over his features - a mask that was so startlingly, eerily similar to that of her elven companions, that Buffy couldn't help but try and force her heavy body to recoil from this contradiction in appearance and nature that sat beside her. "No, you were born to create us," he murmured, watching as her anger dissolved like the brave front that it was, visibly crumbling until nothing remained but the trembling, vulnerable young woman that was helpless to prevent this horrid twist of fate from further spinning out of control. "Thanks to you, we will become everything that we were always meant to be. Buffy-"
"Don't," Buffy stammered, hating the tears that burned at the corners of her eyes. "Don't you dare say my name," she warned in a voice that trembled with the fear that Vashnak spoke the truth - that her many victories and defeats were always meant to lead her to this one horrible moment.
Black eyes flashing, Vashnak stared down at her stony features and slowly reached one hand forward - only to watch as Buffy's head forcibly lolled to the side in an obvious evasion of his touch. Pale features tightening, he reached out and seized her chin in a painful grip and forcefully turned her head towards him, refusing to allow her to look away. "You think of them - of the elves that traveled with you," he guessed as her eyes stubbornly avoided his own. "Well it matters not," he stated dismissively as he released his hold, her head falling limply to the side. "Do you think that they would want you now, knowing of the darkness that is inside you?"
"It's not darkness," Buffy bit back, at once angry with herself for continually rising to Vashnak's bait. But his words carried whispers of truth that she couldn't ignore, and if she didn't refute them out loud, she half-feared that the words would slither inside her, polluting and poisoning that which she had always believed... what she needed to believe in order to survive. To think that just a few short weeks ago she had been willing to kill herself without hesitation if it only meant that she could make things right again for her world. In a strange, twisted way, things had been much simpler then - more black and white. She was Good. The First Evil was Bad. If she needed to die to save the world, she would do it in a heartbeat because that's what it meant to be one of the good guys. But now? Now she didn't know where she stood. "It's not darkness," Buffy repeated, more to herself than Vashnak as she once more turned her eyes away. "I just..."
"Why does this so surprise you?" he asked, startling Buffy as she heard no malice in Vashnak's voice - only an honest curiosity as the orc-turned-elf regarded her with his piercing black eyes. "Has your blood never before been coveted for its power? Has it never healed another?"
As a true sign to her confusion, Buffy actually considered these questions as she quietly turned her eyes to the dark night that lay swathed in shadows beyond the parted curtains. Coveted for power? According to Spike, a slayer's blood was an extra special treat for a vampire. But coveted? Used to heal another? The idea was ludicrous... and yet was it? Offhand, she could only think of three different times when her blood had been tasted by another, and while nothing remarkable came about when Dracula had a taste, the first two...
The Master needed her blood in order to escape his prison and enter the world, and Angel... Angel needed the blood of a Slayer to survive the poison that coursed through his body. He had needed her blood to heal the damage that had been wrought and to cure him- and why in the hell had they never questioned this before? When she had been Called as the Slayer, she had learned firsthand about how quickly her body healed from the many different mishaps that were all apart of the Slayer package - and not once had she ever wondered where the healing mojo came from. She always thought it was just another part of the slayer package.
"One of the perks of being the Slayer is a speedier rehab for the bumps, bruises, and severed limbs that are pretty much unavoidable in my line of work."
How could she have ever guessed that her slayer healing could be attributed to something specific? To something concrete and something that could be coveted? Something that could be sought after? Well now she knew. It was her blood that made her shrug off broken ribs and internal bleeding as though nothing more than a scratch and a bloody nose - and the longer that she was the slayer, the more potent her blood became. There used to be a time when a stab wound would leave her incapacitated for days. Now a mangled chest of broken ribs would only slow her. There used to be a time when sickness would keep her bed-ridden, or even worse, send her to the hospital. Now she couldn't even remember the last time she had a runny nose. And now her blood was becoming so potent that a mouthful was enough to undo a millenniums' worth of torture and abuse that had been done to Vashnak's ancestors. Hell, they might as well call her Fawkes or stick a Johnson and Johnson label on her forehead. The only difference was, unlike Harry Potter's mystical phoenix, she didn't need to cry in order to heal these bastards - she needed to bleed - and even if her time here in Middle-earth seemed to indicate otherwise, needing her tears would have been a lot more difficult than her blood. As it was, they could just stick a fork in her, turn her over and call her done because while she could have stopped herself from crying if it meant saving the world - or even saving what was left of her shredded pride - it wasn't as though she could really stop herself from bleeding. Even a paper-cut could spell doom for all of Middle-earth.
"The blood of a slayer... it... it heals," she muttered, unaware that she had spoken the words aloud until a soft hand was pressed against her cheek, once more drawing her waning attention back to the creature that sat beside her.
"And heal you have," Vashnak murmured before standing and disappearing from sight, the soft snick of a closing door echoing with the finality of his words.
For a moment, Buffy allowed the empty quiet to envelop her racing thoughts as she sagged back against the soft mattress, her lax muscles twitching beneath the heavy remnants of the drug that had been used upon her. She didn't know whether to laugh or cry at the thought that her life had been building to this moment when she could be harvested for her blood. In the end, neither seemed fitting as she decided that she had cried enough tears to last her a lifetime and that her situation hardly warranted a chuckle or two. It didn't take a degree in medicine to tell her that no matter how well she was treated, there was no way her body could compensate for losing that much blood each day - slayer or not. There was a reason that the Red Cross only let you donate once every two or three months, and even if she never really paid attention to the reasons before, she was pretty positive that in the end, it meant that all of her hard work and sacrifices for the last seven years had bought her nothing more than a very slow and meaningless death. Meaningless if you ignored the fact that in the meantime, she was going to supply the fuel to build an army of darkness.
"This sucks."
Six days had come and gone since the morning that Buffy had disappeared. Six days of fruitless searches that had always come up empty, her whereabouts continually unknown. Six days that should have passed as though a blink of an eye to one of the Firstborn, and yet six days that seemed to drag by slower than the passing of six decades to the fair-haired Elf that returned to Edoras with defeat pressing heavily upon his shoulders.
In the woods, it was nigh on impossible for a Wood Elf to lose a trail, yet amongst the empty plains of Rohan, Legolas was once more forced to turn to the experienced eyes of his friend as Aragorn guided their party across the vast plains - and back again - and back once more. Between he and Aragorn, they had once been able to track a band of Uruk-hai and their Hobbit prisoners for leagues over these same plains, and yet the task of tracking Vashnak and Buffy was proving fruitless. No, the task of even finding the correct trail to follow was not only fruitless, but impossible. This time they weren't following the heavy tread of orcs upon the fields of Rohan. This time they were tasked to follow the tracks of the great black stallion that witnesses had associated with the dark elf.
Yes, they were supposed to track one horse in the land of Horse-Lords - a grassy country where the number of horses most likely surpassed the number of people, and where the heavy print of hoof marks riddled the plains.
It had taken them six days to admit defeat. Six days of wandering the plains of Rohan with Aragorn, the twins, Mirdan and Thoron, Aragorn's small contingent of Gondorian guards, as well as omer and a full complement of Rohirrim soldiers, desperately searching for that one fateful trail before finally admitting that by now, Vashnak could be nearing the borders of Mordor for all they knew, or perhaps safely encased in the lower reaches of Mirkwood, or hidden deep within a cave in the White or Misty Mountains. He could be anywhere, which meant that Buffy could be anywhere.
To Aragorn and omer, and to the men of Gondor and Rohan, this defeat meant that a dangerous weapon had fallen into enemy hands. To his companions, this defeat meant that and so much more. It meant that their companion had fallen and was in danger - and that they were powerless to help. To Legolas... to Legolas it meant that Buffy was once more back in that bloodied clearing, bound and beaten before her captors... and even worse, this time she was alone.
"Man prestidh den?"
Legolas turned from his dark thoughts to find that Aragorn had maneuvered his magnificent black horse until it cantered softly beside him, the steed's proud head held high with the setting sun glistening off of his dark mane. "Need you truly ask what is troubling me?" the archer asked, his eyes briefly meeting those of his friend before he turned to the towering wooden gate of Edoras that was slowly opening before them.
"No, mellon-nin," Aragorn sighed as he brushed a tired hand over his whiskered cheeks. "No, I suppose I need not," he admitted as he cast his gaze to the proud green banners of Rohan and the waving standards of Gondor, flapping angrily in the sharp wind. "It is never easy to admit defeat - especially when the stakes are so high," he whispered as his horse followed the other steeds through the twisted streets of Edoras, climbing ever higher towards the Golden Hall of Meduseld. "And yet there was nothing more that we could have done," he reasoned, more to himself than his quiet companion. "I fear that she is lost to us - perhaps to this world as well. If it is her blood that they want, we may have already been too late within hours of her abduction. For now we must look to ourselves and make the necessary preparations for what is to come."
"You mean to return to Minas Tirith, then?" Legolas asked, his face betraying little of the hurt and betrayal that surged through him at Aragorn's callous words. Of course, he reasoned, it would be difficult for his friend to see the innocent person that was being destroyed in this. He had a kingdom to think of - and a war to prepare for.
"Of course," Aragorn returned, his silver-gray eyes narrowing upon his friend. "And I thought that you would be returning to your colony in Ithilien, as well," he added, half-conscious of the fact that they had reached the steps to Meduseld and of the stable hand that stood at attention beside him, ready to see to his horse's needs. "After all, if not even you or Elladan nor Elrohir were able to see this creature for what he was, how do you expect your people to fare? They need to be warned-"
"And they shall," Legolas interrupted, his voice becoming curt as he lithely slid from Drlum's high back, his steely blue eyes locking his friend within their stony glare. "Once we return to Minas Tirith, I will send Thoron and Mirdan on with warning to the colony."
"But Legolas, you are their lord and-"
"And I will serve my people best not by hiding in Ithilien," Legolas snapped as he began to turn from his friend, intent on following the others into the Golden Hall and escaping this madness - only to have a familiar, heavy hand fall upon his shoulder, impeding his progress and forcing him to turn and face the damage that he had wrought with his harsh words.
"Legolas-"
Legolas wearily shook his head, stilling his friend's concerned words as he once more reached for the tattered edges of his Elvish stoicism. "Nay Aragorn - not now," he pleaded as he forced himself to meet the king's wizened gaze, and recoiled at the hurt that shone in those gray depths. "I am sorry, mellon-nin, but I know not what else to do," he admitted with a helpless shrug as he turned his eyes to the empty plains that were visible below the sloping hill, opening in a stunning panoramic view that was backlit by the warm glow of the setting sun. "I understand the price that can be paid with the spilling of her blood, and yet it is not so simple for me. In my eyes she is more than a tool to be used, for I have laughed with her and I have bled with her. And now I have lost her, just as we had lost Merry and Pippin so many years ago."
"Yes, but Merry and Pippin did not stay lost forever," Aragorn offered as he gently squeezed Legolas' shoulders, trying in vain to take back his careless words as he offered his friend what little he could. "Perhaps I am wrong and Iluvatar has something different in mind for her."
"Perhaps," Legolas allowed, his searching gaze returning to his friend's face with a small, sad smile. "Regardless, I do not think I will best offer whatever help I can from the trees of Ithilien. No. I will return with you and Arwen to Minas Tirith."
"What's this I hear? A Wood-Elf choosing a city of stone over a forest? Perhaps there is hope for your kind, yet."
Smiling softly, Legolas turned to find a familiar short, stocky dwarf descending the stone stairs of Meduseld, the setting sun causing his red beard to shimmer with fiery light. "Gimli, my friend, what brings you to Edoras?"
"A letter from the lovely Lothriel bade me to make all haste in coming to these Golden Halls," the stout dwarf returned with a small smile, his dark eyes glittering warmly as he gripped Legolas' arms in greeting before turning to Aragorn. "Thus you can imagine my surprise when I arrive to find naught but two queens of unmatched beauty and a city devoid of their kings and lords. Four days have passed since and I began to wonder if you two would ever return," he added as he slapped his hand against their shoulders, watching in amusement as both Man and Elf staggered beneath the twin blows.
"Our apologies, Master Dwarf, for making you wait so," Aragorn returned, a bit of sparkle returning to his gray eyes at the unending joviality of the stout creature.
"Apology accepted," Gimli immediately returned as he winked slyly at his elven friend, "though you mistake my meaning if you think that a true complaint can be filed when one is left stranded amongst such gentle company. Truly Aragorn, your wife is a delight and very easy on the eyes - for an elf, that is," he amended with a pointed look in Legolas' direction - only to have his good humor falter beneath the weak smile that he earned from his dearest friend. Sighing, the dwarf took the route of all of his kind and quickly got to the heart of the matter. "I take it, then, that you didn't find the lass," he stated as he looked from one heavy face to another, working off of the limited information that both Arwen and Lothriel had been able to provide.
"No, Gimli, we did not," Aragorn sighed as he, too, looked to their elven companion as the archer turned to the setting sun. "No, we did not."
"Hrumph," Gimli muttered as he eyed his quiet friend, his small eyes narrowed thoughtfully. "Then how long until we leave?" he asked, not really surprising Man nor Elf with his words.
"Then you will travel with us, elvellon," Legolas surmised as he finally turned from the setting sun, a small, thankful smile lifting his lips.
"If that white demon of yours will bear my weight, of course I shall," Gimli returned, missing the pained expression that flashed lightening quick in the elf's eyes at the mention of his beloved horse, now forever resting in the forests of Mirkwood. "After all, I fear that you shall have need of the level-headed thoughts of a Dwarf in the coming days - someone to counter a creature with such flighty tendencies," he goaded with a wide smile as he clapped the tall Elf on the back. "Besides, you both have already seen what happens when you go hunting without the eyes of a Dwarf," he added as he nudged the tall Man beside him, "for everyone knows that without me, the two of you would have been lost upon the fields of Rohan years ago - and then where would Merry and Pippin be?"
"My guess would be fat and content, no matter where they rested," Aragorn returned with a dry chuckle as he turned and led his friends up the stone steps to the Great Hall. "You need not fear for their sakes, my friend, for I guarantee that those two are capable of being no less."
Smiling at the light-hearted exchange, Legolas trailed after his friends, half-listening to their words even as his thoughts remained locked on the one whose fate was swathed in uncertainty. She should have been there to meet Gimli, for he had a feeling that the two would have gotten on quite well. Even Aragorn, having been raised amongst Elves, would have greeted her far differently than the others of her kind that she had met during their travels... had he only had a chance.
Smile slipping ever so slowly from his fair features, Legolas paused at the highest step and once more cast his sharp gaze upon the dying day. "Dartho ah nin, mellon-nin," he murmured, his soft voice whispering the Elvish words to the quiet world. "Stay with me, my friend," he repeated before turning and following his friends into the shadowed Hall.
"I wanna get you in the backseat, windows up, that's the way you like to... fuck," Buffy cursed, pausing mid-cadence as her trembling fingers fumbled the small metal shard, causing it to tumble to the stone floor. Sighing wearily, the petite slayer slowly bent her tired body and groped along the shadowed crevices until she reclaimed her prize. "What about in the candy store, that chocolate chocolate make it melt," she continued, the lyrics sounding somewhat flat and distant to her hazy mind as she jabbed the sliver back into the sturdy lock that adorned the tall, floor-to-ceiling glass doors that led out onto the shadowed balcony - the balcony that seemed determinedly out of reach. "Whips and chains, handcuffs, smack a little bootie up with my... damnit!" she cursed again as her fingers cramped and seized in a painful spasm that once more dropped the small sliver into the shadows.
Sighing dejectedly, Buffy scowled at the stubborn lock before turning away, abandoning what was most likely a fruitless endeavor, and moved as though in a trance to the large bed that was covered in tousled sheets and blankets. Time passed in a strange monotony in her new prison, days creeping into nights and back into days again with little fanfare, and only the brightly shining sun and moon to mark the inevitable and steady creep of time. Days had passed - perhaps weeks - with nothing to show except for the slow weakening of her body and the wounded wrist that barely had time to heal before it would be sliced open again. The time had been slow and torturous, allowing far too much opportunity to dwell upon dark thoughts and not nearly enough to show the creatures what a slayer was truly capable of - especially a captive slayer, which had always seemed a contradiction in terms alone. At least... before it always had. These days, Buffy seemed to be someone's captive more often than not.
Falling back upon the soft mattress, limbs strewn haphazardly in every direction, Buffy cast her gaze upon the stone ceiling that shifted with the flickering light of the torches. The first time that her chains had been removed, three orcs had died by her hand - including one that had only recently recovered from the painful transformation that the she-orc had undergone. That, of course, had meant the return of the chains for another interminable period of time. The next time the chains went off, two of the newly changed creatures had met their rather gruesome end. What followed then was an even longer, grimmer time of chains and total incapacity. But now? Now the chains had been off for the majority of this night that seemed to have no end, and not a single orc was dead.
She told herself that the only reason that they lived was because her time in chains had taught her a valuable lesson in patience and in waiting for the opportune moment, and while that seemed like a valid enough reason, another part of her that she obstinately refused to acknowledge, continued to whisper that perhaps the reason for her reluctance was due more to the fact that her body was getting weaker by the day. She felt light-headed and dizzy when she stood, she became short of breath from the short trek from the bed to the window, and she was beginning to find it more and more difficult to concentrate on anything for long - and none of these symptoms pointed to particularly good things. She wasn't blind to these changes - she simply had decided upon ignorance over the despair that acknowledgement would bring.
Not that despair had been a completely foreign feeling these last few... well, however long it had been. She was a Slayer that was born to combat the darkness that shadowed the edges of her world - a warrior that could have kicked Xena's butt if given half the chance, and yet here she was, helpless prisoner and damsel in distress to a group of nasties that were using her blood to create an army. Oh yeah - this had to be a high point in the history of the Slayer.
As metal grated against metal, Buffy was up and moving away from the bed even as the key finished its turn in the rusted lock, forcing her heavy body to heed her instinctive commands as she threw herself across the room. Behind her the large door swung open to allow Vashnak, one orc, and three EBIDs, as she had dubbed them, to step into the room. The EBID acronym, otherwise known as Evil Bastards In Disguise, was the result of one long night that never seemed to end - much like this night. It had been disturbing to associate the evil creatures with the kind elves which whom she had traveled for what had once seemed like a long period of time, and seeing as how the creatures weren't orcs anymore, and since she refused to think of them as Elves, the EBID species had been born. Not that she had been quick to offer that information to Vashnak or his cronies.
Frowning, Buffy lifted her chin and glared defiantly at the small entourage, even as she unconsciously pressed her back against the heavy curtains on the far wall, her arms crossed defensively across her chest with her injured wrist tucked securely against the soft folds of her leather halter - a halter that she was sure was beginning to smell a little rank by now, seeing as how she hadn't had a real bath in Valar only knew how long.
Freezing at that small slip, Buffy felt her cold mask shift as her scattered thoughts became distracted by memories of Legolas, Mirdan, and the Twins. It truly felt like ages since she had seen them last, and for all she knew, it could have been. It was funny, actually, for at the time, Buffy thought that her travels with the elves seemed to drag on forever. But now? Now she couldn't help but feel as though that relatively peaceful time had been but a passing dream in comparison to this unending nightmare. The faces of her new friends that had once been so clear in her memories were now beginning to blur and fade, only to be replaced by those that her blood had created. Was it just her or did the two male EBIDs that seemed attached to Vashnak's hips resemble the twin sons of Elrond? Someone had once told her that there truly was no such thing as black hair - merely hair that was so dark brown that it appeared black - but wasn't Elrohir and Elladan's hair a close match to their shining ebony? And were their faces that pale and their eyes that black? Did they glitter like those of Dergu and Guol? And the she-EBID that seemed to have taken on the role of her care-taker... if you got rid of the small breasts, softened her pointed features, flattened her curves and added on a few inches, couldn't Sugha have been mistaken for Mirdan? And what of Vashnak himself? Didn't he pay a close resemblance to Thoron?
In the end, Legolas' fair features were the only ones that remained clear and unpolluted in her mind. Whether this was because there was no mistaking his pale golden locks for the dark ebony that seemed inherent in the EBIDs, or whether it was because of the long night they had spent as companions in an orc encampment, she couldn't say for certain. The only thing that mattered was that when she became most confused, she always had that one shining image to hold onto - that one shining image that remained clear as she fought to keep from breaking beneath the oppressive weight that thickened the very air she breathed.
"I told you to rest," Sugha snapped, her melodious voice strained by the harsh edge that lined her words as she strode angrily towards the slayer. Her dark eyes snapping in ire, the tall EBID roughly seized Buffy's arm and began dragging her back towards the bed.
"And I told you to shove it," the slayer retorted, somewhat woodenly as she forced her scattered thoughts to find a hazy focus as she twisted her arm from the EBID's pincer-like grip, desperately searching for that remaining flicker of her usual fire and fanning it to life.
"Use that tone with me again and I will make you rest!" Sugha warned, a slow, delicious smile curving her thin lips.
"Touch me again and I'll return the favor!" Buffy returned, her eyes narrowed upon the dark-haired female that towered over her increasingly waif-like frame as she felt her muscles coil, bracing herself for the blow that she knew would come. The EBIDs may have carried the faces and wore the bodies of the elves that their ancestors had once been, but whatever lurked inside hadn't been touched by her blood. The changes hadn't gone that deep and the creatures were just as violent, angry, and evil as ever - only smarter.
And that was were Vashnak had been wrong.
These creatures didn't revere her for who she was. They didn't treat her as their Goddess or their Mother - or maybe they did if orcs generally wanted to maim, torture, and kill the one that birthed them, which was an entirely real possibility. What they did revere was her blood and her blood alone. The person that carried her blood, the one with thoughts, feelings, and one hell of a mouth, was just the baggage to endure as they tapped her like a keg and slowly drained her dry. She was property and nothing more - and that thought never failed to trigger her already short temper.
Ducking beneath Sugha's coiled fist with far less speed and grace than anticipated, Buffy nonetheless swiveled to the side, teetered a moment before regaining her waning balance, and then decided against a kick that would most likely have toppled her completely and retaliated with her own punch - a punch that had all of her strength and weight behind it. Which of course made it all the worse when Sugha effortlessly caught her fist in her open palm and then easily shoved Buffy so that her back collided with the sturdy glass which shook against its wooden frame. Grunting as the wind was knocked from her lungs, Buffy slid bonelessly against the thick glass, her legs folding beneath her as she collapsed upon the cold stone floor.
And in that moment, Buffy felt as though she had truly hit rock bottom.
Wide green eyes staring blankly at the ground before her, she felt her mind begin to spin as the despair rose within her until she was drowning in the murky depths.
She couldn't fight this.
She was a Slayer and she couldn't fight this.
Her body was tired and her spirit was exhausted - and her heart... her already battered heart was slowly cracking and crumbling into shattered fragments. The tape was slipping and the pieces that she had carefully patched back together were falling loose. There was nothing to hang on to here - no hope bright enough to keep her steady. All that was left was anger and despair, and even the anger wasn't enough to sustain the will within her. When she had battled against Angelus all those many years ago, he had slowly stripped away everything that mattered, but in the end, she had had herself and that was enough, but now her body was betraying her, and not even her strength remained.
Vaguely, Buffy was aware of her tormentors turning from her, dismissing her for the non-threat that she posed as they began to gather the implements for another blood-letting. It didn't matter to them if her spirit was broken. They didn't care if the fire was forever dampened. All that mattered was her blood, for that was all that she had to offer to this strange world. The blood that would strengthen their ranks and cause their darkness to encroach on the natural beauty of this place of dark forests, wide rivers, fading trees, and wide plains. They would use her to destroy... and suddenly, with nothing else to sustain her, Buffy at least knew one thing:
She wouldn't bleed for them again.
Even as Dergu and Guol reached for her, Buffy's small fingers found the metal sliver that she had lost here in these shadows - the piece that was half as long as her pinkie finger now enclosed in her fist as she was hauled to her feet and propelled towards the hated bed. There she was dumped, her body slung forward across the mattress which sagged beneath her slight weight with her closed fist pressed between her breast and the tangled sheets beneath her, her wounded wrist lying limply beside her.
The sliver was small and blunt, something that she never would have considered a weapon in days past, but it was all she had and as Sugha's hands closed around her wounded wrist and began dragging it towards the edge of the bed, Buffy knew that it would be enough.
Before the dagger had a chance to reopen the closed wound on her wrist, Buffy forced the closed fist open, arching her back slightly to allow her shaking fingers to seize the sliver between forefinger and thumb before she tore her arm free of her own heavy weight. Then, with dry eyes and without a single word, plea, or final goodbye, the slayer jabbed the blunt end towards the thrumming artery in her neck with the remnants of her faded strength - only to have her hand wrenched away, caught in the tight grip of another before her throat could be sliced and her life painfully and messily ended in the only way she knew how.
Breath catching in her throat, Buffy felt a sob choke her as the tears finally came, burning her wide eyes as the sliver was wrenched from her palm by a warm touch that was becoming all too familiar. "No," she whispered, the word a choked plea - a denial that this, too, could be taken from her as she recoiled from Vashnak's touch, twisting her body on the bed as she jerked her hand free from Sugha's hold, rolling onto her back with her wounded arm twisting beneath her. "No," she repeated, the word coming as a hitching sob as tears streamed down her face, wetting her tangled hair and soaking the blankets beneath her.
But her captors weren't to be denied and even as her words began to fall faster, the chains were brought forward, imprisoning her for the last time as her brain began to shut down. All that existed was her shaking body, her hitching breaths, and the wrist that was forced over the side of the bed by cruel hands - and the knife that was lowered towards the pale flesh. Soon, no reason remained and as the knife cut through flesh, the words were transformed into screams and Buffy fell into madness.