Typical disclaimer applies. Just a brief interlude before we pick back up in chapter 9.
Chapter 8
Kara thought about the past as she worked. Meeting Tara in that music class at the University, when she hadn't been looking to make any friends. The struggle before that to get used to her new hyperactive senses. Seeing Spike in The Bronze for the first time. Hearing his voice for the first time at The Magic Box a few days later, complimenting her on sparring with Giles, and feeling his eyes on her ass as she'd left. Not even caring when she found out he was a vampire. He was so curious about what made her different, and it hadn't fazed him a bit when she'd finally told him the whole story at Christmas. Of course, why would it, when he wasn't human?
The whole supernatural thing – she'd been accepting at first, when nothing had been asked of her but to adapt to her powers, but then, she'd had to protect the village she had been made in from an invasion of reptile demons. And that was okay, scary, but okay, because that was her purpose as a Protector. It was her duty to protect the Keepers of the Stone for 100 years, until the next girl was called. She killed the demons, the Elder said they would be safe for quite a while, they partied, and Kara went back to her normal life. She patrolled some in Sunnydale for fun and spent time with her new friends.
Until a bounty hunter was sent after her, and Buffy. She'd been on her way to Spike's, who'd really been becoming one of her closest friends, and the bounty hunter had shot her with a tranquilizer dart. Kara had barely made it into the crypt before she'd passed out, smacking her temple on the stone sarcophagus. She'd woken up the next day at the Summer's house. Spike had taken her home to her apartment that evening, and insisted on staying by her side as long as she was being hunted. After almost being shot outside the apartment, she had had enough, and fled for the safety of her house. He hadn't left her alone there, either.
Spike hadn't given up until she opened the front door.
"Is it always going to be like this?" she'd asked.
"Like what, luv?"
"People trying to kill me, or my friends. This is not how I want my life to be for the next 100 years."
"You'll only be a target as long as you're fighting evil," he'd said.
She'd thought about it all, and after sending Spike home the next day, she'd made plans for a long vacation, telling no one but her sister where she was heading. Kara ended up being gone for almost two months, only coming back for a benefit she had promised to sing for. Tara had been the one to warn her that Spike's feelings were more than platonic, and his anger every time she ran off started making more sense. It still bugged the hell out of him when she avoided an issue, but she'd warned him before they ever got together that she had things to work through that weren't easy.
"I had the whole involved thing, twice. It didn't work out so well. Do you have any idea what it's like to compete with a memory? To be told after five years that the one you love still wants the memory more than you? He wanted space to sort himself out. I did that, and I was the perfectly supportive girlfriend. Then, I find out that he asked out my friend because she reminded him a bit of her. My friend turned him down immediately, so he came back to me. He doesn't know that I know he did that. I tried to write it off to his confusion, the emotional mess he was going through, but I could never forget it. He'd never looked at another woman above me before. He was a lot better toward me after we reconciled, more sweet and thoughtful, affectionate. I really tried, for a full year, but I just couldn't trust him again like I used to. My entire life was wrapped up in his for several years. So, yeah, the freedom has been damn important," Kara had explained. That conversation had taken place three days before they started dating.
It took her two months after that to be comfortable with anything more kissing, and even that had made her break away when it got too intense. Spike was so patient with her, when she finally told him why it bothered her so much. In her last relationship, she had felt obligated to please her guy, even used, just to keep him from breaking her heart again, and she learned to block off herself before allowing anything to happen after a while, to not allow that vulnerability. Physical intimacy bared too much of her soul. It took Spike, a soulless vampire, to make her feel safe enough to trust a man with her body again, and they had had one hell of a Christmas night celebration. And one night seemed to have opened the floodgates on her desire for him.
November 16th had been the night of the ritual to use her link to the Stone…
"Is everybody going to give me a hard time about this? It's not like I chose to become a goddess," she snapped.
"Yes, how did you come to be in that fortress?"
"I didn't have a choice. That's what the powder was for. I had to obey Melkior's commands. The amulet gave me enough resistance to still think, but I couldn't control my body. The release of Kalari's power was just a pleasant side effect to the ritual."
"Tell me about the spell." Giles sat down at the table with his notebook.
"Melkior had me lay down on a stone dais, a slab, and chained my ankles and wrists down. He poured black sand in a circle around it, chanting in a language I didn't know. He went around a few times, 3, 4. Stopped at my side, said some more words, and plunged a dagger into the center of my chest. Hurts like a bitch, by the way. A bubble encased us, from the glowing sand, when he did that. Melkior backed away through the bubble, and chanted new words. Power from the Stone started leeching through me to the air above me to slowly form a gateway. When the gateway was large enough, it rotated to stand on the floor, and Kalen stepped out. He was my little brother, by 100 years. The portal closed, the bubble came down, and I felt him observing me. I'm sure he was confused about where he was. I sat up, pulled the dagger out of my chest, and greeted him as I morphed into Kalari. He wasn't very happy to see me, since I'm the one who locked him away."
"I see. And then you two fought?"
"Yep. Sword fight with the typical personal insults thrown in. When he was vulnerable, I sliced off his head. The only way to kill one of us is by one of our own kind. I'm the last, so…"
"Did you transport the fortress?" Giles asked.
"Yeah. We returned to our home dimension, and I've locked the gateway, so there's no way in or out but through me. Freeing Kalen was Melkior's idea, and Belegurth went along with it because he's a career soldier. Kalen was his leader and best friend. I can't blame him too much for getting lonely after 10,000 years. Making war is all he really knows. He knows I'll kill him the next time he does something remotely out of line, so I have the whole army restoring our homeland. Beautiful place, by the way. Mostly tropical forest."
Only four days in Ossiriand translated to coming back Nov. 30th on Earth. That gap certainly hadn't gone over well with anyone else, especially Spike. Yavanna had appeared to her a few days later with the offer from the Powers. Of course, "picking up some of the slack" in L.A. meant a lot more time required from her than they had inferred, but wasn't that always the way with them? Well, she had set down her terms for not being their bitch, and she was sticking to that. Despite being linked through Spike's claim, their relationship was on rockier ground than ever before, and she was determined to make it up to him.
Whatever that took.
