It was three months ago that Willow had tried to destroy the world. Three months since she became consumed by her own power, and three months since the love of her life had been shot through the heart. It was three months of healing, though it had been extraordinarily painful.
Indeed, she had been expected to put in an effort and an energy that she just couldn't muster, "Just kill me! Or take my powers. Please, I can't do this," she'd said to the head of the coven, Miss Harkness, when they'd first met, "I don't want this power. There's no point without Tara, anyway. Please."
Those first few days since it all happened were foggy in her mind at best. She could hardly remember flying to England, or staying at Giles' apartment in Sunnydale the night before. She'd been confused, Giles had told her, and she deduced from his much kinder words that she had spent those early days verifiably insane.
She did get better, at least in one sense, the fog of insanity eventually lifting and giving way to only guilt, grief, and fear. What would they do to her, she'd wondered once she became more clearly aware of her situation. She could feel the power of the coven, and it made her sick to her stomach. Her own power did, too, as it crackled inside her.
Taking her magick was the original goal, of course. The risk was huge, a good chance she'd die and another that she'd lose her mind, or spend the rest of her life a vegetable. And even if it all went according to plan, the rituals would be excruciating and they would take several weeks. It would leave her weak, confused, and in pain until the day she died.
"Yes, please take them," Willow had begged, "I... I feel it in my veins, in my fingers, and it hurts—or it wants to hurt. I don't care if I die. Please, can we try?"
So they had tried, but after the first ritual had Willow coughing up blood, temporarily blind, and babbling in insanity, Giles insisted the coven stop.
She'd been informed that killing her just wasn't an option, and even after a particularly dangerous display of the powers outside of her control nearly endangered the lives of some of the witches, Willow overheard, her abilities working unconsciously to allow her to hear the conversation in the next room, Giles simply would not have it. "If you hurt her," he'd said, "I will take her far away from here. And you'll have made enemies of the both of us." Apparently, making an enemy of Willow was so terrifying to the coven that they'd abandoned the idea of her euthanization almost immediately.
And that was how they'd come to the third option: to rehabilitate Willow, to train her to use her powers correctly and to control them responsibly. At first Willow had refused to cast. She could feel her own lack of control, could tell that the moment she let herself slip it would all come rushing out. But the abstinence started to make her sick and the buildup of power would certainly lead to another breakdown. So Giles brought her to a field where the witches started throwing magickal attacks at her until she was forced instinctually to defend herself with a spell that sent them flying against the trees.
It took her a long time, long enough that the coven began to think their efforts were never going to work. But eventually Willow started to show signs of improvement. These "lessons", as they'd called them, felt more like a reward to Willow than a punishment. It made her feel guilty. For four years, since the death of Jenny Calendar, Willow had wished for someone to teach her about magicks. She'd had that in Tara, a teacher of sorts, until she surpassed her in power, though not, she hadn't realized until it all went wrong, in knowledge.
And now an entire coven of witches was teaching her how to control her gift, her curse. She only wished she'd had them when she still wanted to use it. Once the witches got her to cast, Willow found that a wandering thought would shatter windows, a moment of anger blowing power or a bad dream lighting fires in her sleep. It was terrifying, and now she couldn't stop. So when Giles and the coven explained to her that she could control it, with work, despite her wanting nothing to do with the power again, she had agreed.
Each day she was sent to a hall, or sometimes the fields outside, to train with various witches in all the areas of magick. Just sensing, at first, reading auras (at which Tara had always excelled, though Willow was too unfocused to get the hang of it), experiencing the Earth and learning to live with everything her deep connection to the world meant she could always feel. And eventually she was floating pencils again, her frustration with the beginner task and her lack of control at first sending them clean through walls. And once she got the hang of that, she was healing plants, and then animals.
Once Miss Harkness took a blade to Willow's arm but forced her to let it heal naturally, not to give into her power, the "easy fix". And Willow had really tried, but when she'd glanced under the bandage hours later, there hadn't even been a scratch. Three more times the witch had sliced Willow's arm, Willow healing herself unconsciously or in her sleep. But the fourth time, she'd done it—a small scar as proof, like a token, or a gold star sticker. It was a huge step for her, resisting the urge to heal herself and her powers listening when she said "no".
Sometimes her control slipped. And she could tell, with the way the witches looked at her, that they were afraid of it. Of her. Tiptoeing, she knew, for if they said the wrong words, and sometimes they did, her eyes would turn black, the pain that she felt in the Earth would turn the loudest. And sometimes she felt like the only thing keeping her from destroying the witches and then the world was some inexplicable voice in the back of her head.
In each of her "lessons" several other witches would be present, ready to take her on in case she lost control. She wore bracelets, made of some old leather, enchanted, that would allow the coven to temporarily bind her powers at a moment's notice. Like a leash, she figured. Like she was a wild animal. And it was something they used liberally, the binding, especially at first, whenever she turned irrational or when her magicks were controlling her more than she was controlling them. Whenever her eyes went black or a stray thought flickered a lightbulb. Sometimes she would beg them to bind her, and sometimes she would beg them not to. It was agonizing, painful, like being blinded by having nails hammered into your eyes.
But less and less frequently this needed to happen, as she started to grasp control. And fewer and fewer witches were present at her lessons to guard her until it was just she and her teachers.
Eventually it was Miss Harkness herself who taught her combat magick. "Why do I need this?" Willow had asked, terrified to conjure her first fireball in months, "I don't need magic for violence. I don't want to hurt anyone." But Miss Harkness had explained to her that she couldn't pick and choose which areas of her magicks she wanted to develop, and that if she didn't practice using the most dangerous parts of her powers then she would never have control over them.
The lessons were unexpected, considering that Willow had figured she would be killed or worse when Giles took her from Sunnydale. But what surprised her most about the last three months was everything else, besides the magick. Members of the coven acted as tutors and taught her histories and sciences that her public school education had completely ignored, things her teachers and her professors probably didn't even know. She learned about planets and physics and the universe, plants and animals and ancient civilizations. The history of magick itself. It was all fascinating to her, and she felt guilty about how much fun she was having.
She was taught philosophy and morality, and felt childish when she was forced to do things like write letters to her friends that would never be sent or draw pictures of people she loved. All, apparently, to train her heart and to lighten her soul. They had her meditate, taught her to acknowledge her darkness but not to use it.
And then there was the physical stuff, which Willow had hated the most. Oh, it would have been easy for Buffy, and even Xander had gained some muscle slaying vampires and working in construction. But Willow had relied on books, computers, and magic so long that when the coven brought her to a small gym inside their complex, she wanted to run away. They put her on a training regimen that increased in rigor as she became stronger, and she hated every second. Her addiction had made her weaker, and it took all of her self-control not to magically enhance her strength and agility just to get through it. She had, in the beginning, once or twice, an accident that she mistook for her own physical improvement. They'd bound her, those times, once they'd found out. For everyone's protection, they'd said, since she wasn't in control. And Willow had agreed, though for her it felt like torture.
The hand, the heart, the mind, the spirit. The realization had dawned on her one nostalgic night, when she thought of when things were simpler. It was how they'd defeated Adam, combining their essences. And look at what had happened when one of the four got out of hand. The coven had her strengthening it all now, to keep her grounded.
These days, Willow was no longer deemed a threat, and she was allowed to use her powers with supervision. She no longer had to wear her bracelets, though she did keep one on her left wrist, for she felt safer knowing it could help her be stopped if something went wrong. She'd thought that the work would end, once she regained control. But it didn't, and any morning when she felt compelled to skip her lessons or hide from exercise Giles somehow always found her.
She lived in a room at the coven, a cozy little place with no TV or air conditioning. She could always feel the magicks here, they swirled around the grounds like winds and made their ways into Willow's nightmares. She felt self-conscious, watched, staying here with powerful witches ready to take her down at any moment. But in her first few weeks when she'd awaken to shattered windows or rising flames, casting accidentally in her tumultuous sleep, she was glad that the coven was so close, reversing her damage and binding her magicks so that she couldn't do the unthinkable.
And that was where she was tonight, three months after she lost everything. Sitting on the bed in her room, a book on her lap but her eyes glossing over the words. She couldn't get her out of her mind. Never could, but something about this night—perhaps it was the healing she'd performed earlier. Something was so Tara about it, saving a baby bird like that. She'd missed the funeral—Giles wouldn't let her stay in Sunnydale more than the night, the darkness of the place was bad for her, and she was bad for it. She was too dangerous, too insane. Had she mourned? For the first time in those three months, she went into the small front pocket of the backpack she'd brought with her from Sunnydale. She'd come with minimal belongings, a few pairs of clothes (she'd purchased more here in England) and other essentials. Nothing connected to Sunnydale. Nothing to remind her.
Except for one thing, which she'd kept through it all, through her addiction and her abstinence and through Tara's death and her journey to England. She opened the pocket carefully, as though she'd be bitten by what was inside. She peaked in, first, just to be sure, and saw glimmering in the candlelight Tara's Doll's Eye Crystal, the one that had belonged to her grandmother and that she had given to Willow. A tear escaped Willow's eye, and she thought that maybe she wasn't ready to remember Tara by mourning with the object. But that voice in her head—it told her it was okay. So she reached slowly into the bag and grasped it as if for her life.
But the moment her fingers touched it, her vision turned black. She felt something, something horrible and yet familiar. Something rising like bile in her throat. Rising into a mouth full of sharp, pointed teeth. Darkness. The opposite of what Tara had been.
She gasped, coming out of it, dropping the crystal to the floor. She wondered why she still saw black, before realizing her eyes were closed. She investigated the crystal, leaning over its position on the wood floor, not touching it for fear of what she'd seen. It had felt evil—she felt evil, and in her reflection in the crystal she saw her eyes were a deep black.
She panicked, then, clenching her fists like it would keep the power in, but when she blinked again the blackness was gone. She wondered if she'd imagined it. Nevertheless, she threw on her sheepskin jacket and picked up the crystal with her sleeve, still afraid to touch it with her skin. She stuck it in her pocket and then ran clumsily out the door.
Giles was living on the coven's property, too, sometimes visiting his own home but so overwhelmed with concern for Willow, and for what the Coven might do to her without him there to defend her, that he insisted on remaining close by. It was a cabin, a small guest house of sorts, and that's where he was now, taking a shower, feeling pride at the progress Willow had displayed for him today. And then suddenly, there was a knock on the door. Frenzied, it continued before he could respond. "Coming!" he called, pulling on a pair of pants.
"Giles!" cried the voice behind the door. It was Willow's. "Giles! Giles, please. Open the door. I'm wigged."
The franticness in her tone increased his urgency, and Giles ran for the door wearing only a pair of pants, a towel draped over his shoulders after he quickly dried his hair. He flung the door open, half-expecting a pair of evil black eyes to greet him. But all he saw was Willow, green-eyed Willow bouncing anxiously on the balls of her feet. "Willow?" he said, "What's happened?"
"Giles, I saw something," Willow explained as he guided her in. "I felt something... Sorry, were you busy?"
"Just showering. Tell me what happened."
"I don't know," Willow said, "Something just… It was dark, Giles. Whatever it was."
"Why didn't you go to one of the witches?" Giles asked.
"I, uh…" Willow hesitated guiltily, "There was so much darkness for a second there. I didn't want them to bind me. I don't think it was me, I really don't."
"I hate it when they do that to you," Giles said.
"No, I get it. They have to when I lose control. So I don't hurt anyone."
"It hurts you though," said Giles, "Doesn't it? You're doing so much better now. Still, they used to do that to you far too often."
"They're scared of me. I'm scared of me," said Willow, "I get it."
"So, your vision?"
"Not a vision. I didn't see anything, it was more like… like a feeling." said Willow, "It was the Earth. My connection, but it wasn't here. It happened when I touched this. It was her's. In my pocket."
Giles reached into the pocket in Willow's coat and held the crystal in his hands, "A Doll's Eye Crystal?"
"It's not a dark thing, Giles," Willow said, "It's light, I can sense that. But when I touched it… It wasn't the crystal, and it wasn't me. It was the Earth."
"Sunnydale," said Giles.
"What?"
"You felt Sunnydale," Giles repeated, "That is where she gave you this crystal. It is connected to Sunnydale, and you tapped into that connection."
Willow paused for a second, "Something was different," Willow said. "I know what Sunnydale feels like. This is worse. It's the Hellmouth. Something's coming, I think."
"Oh Willow," said Giles, "None of this can be easy. Fighting your own darkness while you feel that of the rest of the world. Of your home. I'm so sorry."
"Stop apologizing, Giles," said Willow, "I did this to myself."
"You didn't ask to have this much power," Giles said, "And all I did was hide books from you. I should have helped you, trained you. Maybe you wouldn't have ended up…"
"Or maybe I still would have. Maybe I'm evil."
"No, Willow," Giles said, "You know, Miss Harkness can't figure out how you got it all, your power. Not at first. If it was growing up on the Hellmouth, or your proficiency with the literature, or just happenstance."
"They resent me for that, I think," Willow said, "Here they are, practicing their whole lives. And then some twenty-two-year-old kid who read some books comes along with more power than she knows what to do with."
"You think they're jealous?"
"I don't know. Not jealous. I think they wish it was in better hands. The power, I mean."
"I'll tell them about your vision. Your, erm, feeling," Giles said, and Willow glanced up at him in worry. "I won't let them touch you. They don't enjoy binding you, Willow. They only do what they believe is necessary. They only want to help you." He cleared his throat, "Maybe one of the seers can give us more information about what you saw. Felt."
Willow nodded, attention elsewhere. She was looking at Giles' chest, still uncovered, where an angry scar in the shape of a hand marred it. Her hand.
Giles frowned when he noticed her gaze, her guilt radiating in waves. Willow's hand rose slowly, shakily as she brought it up to his sternum, where she placed it in its own imprint. The fit was perfect.
"I did that to you," Willow said.
"It's healed now," said Giles.
"No," Willow said, "I know what I did."
"It's just a scar, Willow,"
"Don't lie to me, Giles." They only stared at each other for a moment, before Willow looked back down at her hand, still on Giles' chest. She removed it slowly, and beneath it the scar had faded greatly, though it was still visible.
Giles smiled warmly at her, with some pride, but tears welled in Willow's eyes and she couldn't help but burst into hysterical tears. He cradled her in his arms and she sobbed into his scarred chest, the pair reflected warmly in the glossy surface of the Doll's Eye Crystal that sat on the bed beside them.
