3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3—
A/N
So I was thinking about that woman Caron/Charin… who died in Season 2… that old lady with all the herbs and bowls… I am gonna make her a powerful witch lady. She shall be Willow's mentor!

I have this weird desire to write and finish up this story. We shall see how long this mood lasts…
Again, this has not been excessively edited... if you notice any mistakes please let me know.

thanks,

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Willow had gotten herself as set up as she could possibly manage. When she arrived at the area with the platform she had surveyed her surroundings. The area had a large stone circle just standing on its side. There were a few large rocks haphazardly arranged. The locale seemed well maintained. The thought that the grass had been cut recently just popped into her head. The whole area, where she stood, was well kept. This was definitely the place to be to happen upon some friendly people. Did evil people even cut the grass? 'I should think not' she said aloud… trying for a chipper version of Giles.

A couple of yards from the circular ring and on three quarters of the stood another section of tall grasses. She didn't know how far the grasses extended. She was definitely NOT in Sunnydale, and NOT in a botanical garden. She was mentally holding out for an exotic locale in the southern hemisphere But the weather just didn't fit that profile. It was a little chilly and she was glad she had on slightly newer jeans and a flannel hoodie.

The large circle stood on a flat concrete like pedestal, at the end of the dirt packed road. Willow noticed the circle was grey and made of a stone she had never seen before. Then she realized—she had observed few stones. To the left of the circle lay a strange circular and squarish console with a large red stone like center. A bizarre keyboard encircled the red stone, each square with a different marking or design. Willow assumed you would type something and something would happen. But what?

"No reason to dwell on that mystery yet", she whispered.

Being Willow, she had paused and wondered exactly how the large circle stayed mobile. Logically it should be steadily rolling down the hill until it reached some immovable thingy—like a mountain. The circle was large enough for a big troll to walk right through—or a tank. The circle was easily the strangest sculpture she had ever seen. Willow squatted down and gathered grass and dirt in her left hand. She tossed the contents of her hand at the circle.

She was curious if the circle had anything to do with her appearance in this place. While her first instinct was to go up to the circle and try to read the markings she wanted to be sure it wouldn't zap or otherwise harm her. Most of the tossed earth went right through the circle. So no force field. If she had energy she could conceivably jump through the hoop like a trained animal—or maybe not.

Despite the fact that it appeared to just be a decorative circlet, Willow felt it had some latent power. It felt as if it housed potential—something. Kind of like the feeling she got from the Hellmouth or the feeling she got from Buffy when she was in the same room when she performed a spell.

Hm. This circle was definitely something to explore after she had ate a little. Willow sat down against the dais. She was semi-exposed and facing the big old loop. When she had first sat down she had worried that she was too much in view but she reasoned that she would have a quarter of a mile's notice if anyone were walking towards her. Surely she would hear the grasses rustling if someone exited from that area. And the circle—that just wasn't a weakness. Her laptop was out and sitting on a large flat rock. She had it open... and up and running on battery power.

Could she hack into a wireless connection? Nope.

Could she play solitaire? Yep.

Would she? Nope.

She went in her bag again and came up with a tube of low fat plain Pringles. She wanted to dig in and eat the whole tube but she reasoned that just wouldn't be the best plan. She was out in the middle of nowhere without a clue where her next meal would come from. According to the nutritional information a serving was a hundred and fifty calories or seven chips. The can had 8 servings. Combined with the jerky, the gum, and the laptop smashed apple, she'd be dead by the end of the day. She ate 5 chips and felt the gnawing ache in her tummy quiet a little. Should she sit around and wait for someone to show up or should she walk to where the path ended and continue through the grass until she got somewhere.

She decided to sit for a moment or two and try to see if she could do a locator spell. Since Oz had left she had become good friends with Tara Maclay. Tara was a witch with a bit more training than Willow. She was sure she could sift through some emails Tara had sent her on spells. Just before Thanksgiving break, Willow had asked Tara to send her some spells to work on. Willow had been quite surprised when she had opened her in box and come across a large alphabetized file with one or two spells per letter—except for X…. Willow had saved the email to her hard drive and had been working thorough it at a steady pace, when she had the time. She had shown it to Giles and he had provided her with a few cautionary words. He knew, in the end, she would do what she wanted--but like a good father figure he wanted to minimize the probably fallout.

He had told her to stay away from the spells with long gestation periods and with more than three steps. According to Giles, those would only be successful in the hands of a more experienced witch. Willow had felt a little silly being regulated to A, B, C, or 1, 2, 3, spells but after thinking about it she had decided he was probably right. Of course she wasn't going to tell him that. And last night she had modified that somewhat simple four step fire ball making spell into a seven step spell and where was she now?

Willow didn't have a clue.

She wondered if it were better to look for a spell under R for Return or H for Home. Maybe it was best to open up that Locator spell under L. She had tried that one before to locate vamps. It was easy. Was it better for her to know exactly where she was located or was it better to just get the heck out of dodge? If she found out where she was she could possibly hike through the grass to the nearest town and make a phone call. The locator spell would make a map, right? But what if she wasted her energy working on getting her location and then she were to figure out she was in another reality where she couldn't just call home...

The best case scenario was she was still on Earth—but Willow was Hellmouth bred, she didn't expect the best. So she opened up the R file. There wasn't anything about return but there was a spell to run away from home. She opened that one. Maybe she could modify the wording and figure out how to get back to Sunnydale. Maybe she could use the locator spell to locate people? Hm.

Pondering her situation, Willow idly removed the dirt from under the fingernails of her left hand with a thin tubular of grass. She wanted a shower, some cheerios with vanilla soy milk and strawberries. She knew what she wanted; she just needed to figure out just how to get what she wanted.

The best thing to do would be to modify the locator spell. She could make necessary modifications and try to locate friendly people. Then she would just have to get by on her personality and if she was lucky—get to a phone. If she was unlucky and in another reality—Willow was sure Giles would be able to do a similar locator spell and figure out where she was and how to retrieve her. He was well beyond 1, 2, 3, A, B, C, spells.

She tossed the piece of grass to the side and went back into her bag. She had a large quantity of all the herbs needed to manage fire balls. Lucky for her she only needed a small amount of one herb to start the locator spell. This was going to work.

She opened up a word document file and copy/pasted the locator spell. The words were simple—she just needed to change the phrases , 'evil ones—intending harm' to something a little more friendly.

Piece of cake.

With that thought she heard a strange clacking sound. The dais she leaned against was activating. A few of the 'keys', brightened. The circle began to slowly rotate.

This couldn't be good.

There was no way Willow would stay in the path of the circle. She had no idea what would happen. She slapped her laptop shut and grabbed it, her bag and the tube of Pringles. She moved to find cover behind some large stones. She arranged her belongings back in her bag and peeked behind the rock to see exactly what was happening.

There was a loud whoosh and water or slippery like wave zoomed outward. The liquid seemed to be a singular unit. It reversed back onto itself and smoothed over, covering the entire expanse of the circle.

"Woosh." This was all Willow could whisper.