She knew as soon as she opened her eyes that this wasn't real, only a memory forced back into the forefront of her mind in all its vampire clarity by whatever cocktail of magic and drugs the Initiative agent as injected into her almost as soon as her back had hit the medical table they had been attempting to restrain her to.
She knew…. yet she didn't care.
"Now this is a sight I don't ever want to tire of waking to." She purrs just as she had the first time, she'd woken like this.
Willow's musical laughter like ambrosia itself for her ears fills the room as her lover meets her eyes over her pale naked shoulder from across the room. Her sire standing as nude as the day of her human birth in front of the opened window bathed in the silvery golden glow of the moon overhead.
"Pity I was just about to find some other way to wake you." Her sire pouts stalking back toward the bed with more sway in her hips than really needed for holding Tara's complete attention.
"R—RReally?" Tara asks her voice cracking just as it had that night as her hands grab absently at the already rumbled sheets at her sides in anticipation given the lusty haze in those dark eyes.
"Really." Willow parrots crawling back up the bed until she was once again straddling Tara's waist. Now with only a thin sheet separating the proper skin on skin contact, they both longed for.
"Yes, yes this is all fascinating but it's not what I'm looking for." The gruff voice huffed starling Tara while her sire's lips continue to lick and tease at the side of her throat blissfully unaware of their newfound audience at the end of the bed.
"You're the one who's violating my mind, so it's no surprise you may find yourself seeing a few things you don't wish to." Tara growled her arms wrapping defensively around her maker's waist in some foolish attempt to protect some part of Willow's vanity as she slips down to trail more kisses along Tara's naked chest.
"Who says I don't want to see this?" the agent questions a cocky smile pulling at his lips as he speaks.
Another darker snarl builds in Tara's throat at that despite the way her body was arching into Willow's searching mouth whilst her sire continued her teasing pathway from her breasts to area's much, much lower just as she had that night.
The scene quickly changed this one to a seemingly endless corridor lined with doors of varied styles and colors based on the time period of memories they safeguarded. Something a bit more appealing to the eyes than the same repeated door with varied numbers branded into the front.
"Well, that was abrupt." Riley scoffed
Tara's only answer was to flip him off before recrossing her arms tightly over her front. Her dress back in the jeans and light ivy green colored shirt she'd worn to her last art class before once again falling into one of the Initiative's traps.
"Alright then." The soldier sighed turning to the closest door for inspection.
It was made from a thick heavy wood stained with a dark cherry kind of varnish to the arched curve of the wood but didn't take away from the almost vine-like iron of the accents and the handle.
"Aren't vampire allergic as it were to these kinds of…."
"This is my mind I can guard my thoughts with whatever kind of barriers I want." Tara argues
"We'll see about-" but the comment stalled when the door Riley was trying to open remained tightly shut.
Tara gave a humorless force of a laugh as she holds up a round keyring with one finger a number of different keys clattering together as she let the ring bounce once against her finger before making the thing disappear just as quickly as she'd created it.
"Like I said. My mind. My rules."
She knew this was a dream but at the same moment, she knew it was also a memory. A memory she didn't remember having. Her senses were all too heightened for them to be considered normal human levels which to the best of her knowledge she still was.
Plus, it was nighttime somewhere out in the woods when it should be nearing morning on a more modern college campus a clear sign that despite being threatened with one of several rather nasty hexes should they allow it her friends had indeed let her fall prey to the temptation of sleep despite the growing number of things still waiting to be finished.
Namely saving Willow's girl from the Initiative for the second time.
"Mother please."
The sound of Tara's voice draws her closer. She doesn't like the sounds of her pet so upset.
"I will not do it Tara and that is my last word on the matter." Gaea Maclay answers earning a low snarled growl from the listening woman when it triggered another heartbroken sob from the younger slender blonde drawing both Wicca's gazes as she makes her presence known. Melting out of the night like the demon she is.
At once Tara's eyes brighten past the haze of tears and her heart rate kicks up a few beats against Willow's sensitive ears while the grumpy vampire stalks toward her. Even wearing her true face as she was now the love in Tara's mesmerizing gaze never wavered. Maybe her kitten was right. Maybe they were destined for one another.
Tara's skin is warm and flush with life against her palm as she holds her face between her cold hands. "My kitten is upset." Willow whispers in a frown "This won't do at all." She decides nuzzling her forehead with her love while Tara's giggling laughter bubbles from between her soft lip.
"Much better." Willow smiles allowing her true face to slip away into her, more human one as warm arms wrap around her middle drawing her closer toward her love.
"It's not safe for you here." Tara scolds burrowing into the soothing chill of the circle of Willow's arms. "If Father or Don found you-"
"I missed you." Willow argues pressing her nose against Tara's hair breathing her in.
"And I you." Tara agrees pressing a less than innocent kiss against Willow's pale throat.
"Despite this touching display, I will not do what you wish of me." Tara's mother tells them
"Then I will renounce my claim and leave the coven altogether." Tara threatens rounding on her mother from the tight circle of Willow's arms.
"I won't let you."
It wasn't Gaea that speaks but Willow herself as she turns the angry human back toward her.
"The Goddess will understand," Tara argues turning back toward the strong cool body of the vampire holding her sliding her hand back into Willow's hair rubbing behind Willow's ear as if she were some vampire cat, she was attempting to soothe. "She already knows ours is a soul-binding love, my Willow."
"Tara." Her mother cuts in "do not blaspheme-"
"I'm speaking nothing but the truth Mother." Tara snapped her eyes never wavering from Willow's own "It was my connection to the Goddess and her teachings that drew me to Willow in the first place."
"You know your father already promised you to another come sunrise, child."
Willow's more human heart was throwing itself against her ribs by this point now stopping a few beats at the sudden confession the same time a building hiss was coming from the vampire she was currently sharing her mind with.
"the Flynn boy knows full well I do not, cannot, and will never love him." Tara explains still toying with the soft curls at the base of Willow's neck. "Our union will be a shame. One I know the Goddess will never allow to be." She says so confident it makes Willow swoon just a little to witness.
"His family coven is a powerful one."
"Forgive me but his so-called coven worships the moon. A teacher who changes many times over her journey across the sky while yours remains constant and enduring." Willow points out "I may be a creature of the dark as the Flynn boy, his family, and their pack of followers, but I do understand the ways of the Earth just as you and those in your coven do." The vampire goes on her eyes now only trained on the gaze of her love's Coven elder.
"The Goddess walks with you?" the older woman questions warily now.
"She counsels me in her ways too." Willow nodes conjuring dazzling fairy lights with a simple snap of her fingers.
Lights that seem to become amplified in the warm glow of the large ash wood tree the trio was standing in front of.
The Goddess's Tree
"Alright. I'll do it." Gaea Maclay relents "I'll marry you."
"Rise and shine sleepy head- Time to go get my sister back." Anya's loud voice cuts in just when Tara was about to lean in and kiss her just one more time. "Come on let's go." The ex-demon groans while Willow does her best to hold onto the fading bits of memory.