Chapter 3

A/N: Man, I am just a machine right now. Because I'm churning material out so quickly, there might be some errors I didn't catch in the first or second proof, but I'll make sure to correct them as they surface. Also, a big piece is really unusual for me, and I'm not very practiced at constructing larger narratives, so let me know how I'm doing! Constructive criticism is always welcome. Please and thank you!

Time for an emergency family meeting.

All five of them sat in the Cuza's darkened living room. Silent. Except for Gramma Cuza, of course, who seemed to have no off switch in the huddling in a weepy ball department. It wasn't terribly helpful, but everyone copes differently.

Willow and Oz were perched on the couch. Elena sat sullenly in a dilapidated wicker chair and her father paced back and forth, unable to speak. Willow was pursing her lips while Oz pinched the bridge of his nose. It took an awful lot for the expressionless wonder to display any outward sign of frustration, which said a lot about the situation at hand. Namely, that it sucked.

Maybe Bucharest was on a Hellmouth. Willow wondered absently if they could develop some sort of mapping program. It'd be really helpful to know when and where they could expect this sort of thing to crop up, she figured.

"Tell me again," Oz said.

"She change every night," Mr. Cuza muttered, as wild and directionless as a madman. "When light touch her. She change. She fight. Not my little girl."

"Light. The moonlight?"

The poor man nodded.

"That explains the blankets on the windows," Willow mused, mostly to herself. Mr. Cuza shot her a sharp look and the witch fell silent. Not a good time for stating the obvious, she supposed.

"And this started three weeks ago?" Oz continued.

"Three week. She go missing in the night, come home bloody. Wild. Sun set, demon take her."

Oz turned his attention to Elena herself. "And nothing bit you? No animals or people?"

The girl's head shook slowly. "I would remember that."

"Yeah, probably," Oz agreed. He lapsed into silence, turning the matter over in his head. This situation was much more serious than anything he had been prepared to deal with.

"There was..." Elena began after a few moments. All heads in the room turned to look at her. "It was not a bite or... A few weeks ago, there was something strange. I was on my way home, and I don't think anything happened, but there is a – what do you call it?" She closed her eyes, looking for the right word. "Patch. Patch of time missing."

"Missing?" Willow echoed.

"Memory. Missing memory. I woke up at home. Hours later."

Oz sighed. It was less a sigh than a heavy expulsion of air, really. A sign of the overwhelmed. This was bad.

"Do you have any way of restraining Elena when she changes?" he asked the girl's father. Mr. Cuza looked sick.

"Restraining?"

"Yeah. Like. A cage? Or chains."

Gramma Cuza's wailing intensified. Fascinating, as Willow was fairly certain she didn't speak a word of English.

"Nothing hold her," the older man was babbling. "We try keep her inside. Away from window. Away from light."

"And that keeps her from changing?"

"Mostly," Elena murmured.

Oz looked over to his redheaded companion. Gnawing her bottom lip, eyes distant with thought, she shrugged. Willow had nothing.

"Excuse us a moment," Oz announced to the room at large. He rose, and Willow followed suit. Without another word, the pair slipped out of the Cuza home and shut the front door behind them. A conference was in order.

"You ever heard of anything like this?" he asked, once safely out of earshot.

"No," Willow confessed. "Never. Transmuting a creature's nature back and forth is really, really difficult. It requires a tremendous amount of magical energy each time. You remember Amy?"

"Still a rat?"

"Well, no, kind of a homicidal sorceress who wants to annihilate us all, but it took me, like, three years to change her back and that couldn't have helped much." They were pacing the small, barren courtyard outside the tenement, lacking any other options. "This is totally new to me. What about you?"

"I didn't even know variations of the change existed," he muttered. "Doesn't make sense. She changes when the light... could it be a curse?"

"It'd have to be a mighty powerful one, to keep her shifting back and forth every night. Might explain the convenient amnesia, though. Memory modification spells are easy enough." Willow gnawed at her thumbnail. The smart thing to do would be to call Giles or Xander or even Andrew and tap into some of their organization's resources, but the resulting fuss might do more harm than good. It was hard to say with so little to go on. "You know more about this than I do. Where do we start?"

Oz's hands were stuffed into his pockets. His body language locked down when he didn't know what to think. "If she's dangerous, we can't let her change. But I need to see the change to know if she's wolfkin or not."

"Kinda makes you miss the old cage in the library, huh?" Willow mused. "Simpler, mustier times."

Oz smiled. Couldn't be helped.

"Do you think you can work that spell of yours today?" he asked. "Before sundown. I'd like to buy some time before uprooting her, but-"

"But we can't just let her run around eviscerating people, yeah," Willow agreed. "I think I can pull it off this afternoon. I don't know how effective it'll be, since we don't know what's going on. If it is a possession, though, I know it'll hold."

"Cool. Okay. That's something. I'll have to get her out of the city one way or another after that."

Will nodded. "Probably. It's not safe to take our time in such a crowded place."

Oz was looking very hard at her. There was a question in his expression, but he was too polite, too laconic to ask it. Willow got the gist, though. Something in her softened, and she offered her friend (she was fairly sure Oz was still her friend) a genuine smile.

"Don't worry," she told him, reaching out to touch his shoulder. "I'm not going anywhere. I'm with you, Oz."

She thought she saw gratitude passing over his face. Oz's hand reached up to cover hers, to squeeze it like he needed her. Maybe he did. For a moment, they understood each other perfectly.

"Okay," spoke the werewolf. "We've got this. Do you have all the supplies you'll need?"

"Almost. I need something personal of hers, something she can wear. Like a bracelet."

"I think I saw a few of those flying through the air during the melee. Shouldn't be a problem. I'll call some of the older weres I know, see if they know anything."

Willow nodded. There was something about having a mission, she felt. Having a goal. Maybe it was years of experience weighing on her, but nothing else really mattered when something important needed doing – not the past, not awkwardness, not petty, personal issues. There was a sort of freedom in putting it all aside. It felt good.

"Autobots, roll out," she announced.

Oz stared at her as if she had sprouted antlers.

"Xander talks," Willow explained.

"Right." A pause. "Kinda glad I bumped into you."

"You know? Me too."

And off they went.

Three miles south, still in Dristor, a cab pulled into a gas station. From it emerged a man somewhere in his thirties, dark skinned and wide shouldered, with humorless eyes that burned with focus. Not bothering to fuel up, he made a beeline for the store itself. A bell jangled as he entered. The clerk glanced up.

It was curiously empty inside – given the time of day, at least. The space itself was minimal, so racks of snacks and little necessities were stacked closely to form cramped, narrow aisles. Like many of the stores in this part of the city, it smelled of potent spices, body odor and watery cleansing solution. Sunlight flooded the tiny space in wide, golden slats through which dust particles drifted, drawing attention from just how deep the shadows were.

Whistling, the cabbie selected a bottle of some questionable looking grape liquid and a small packet of spiced nuts, turned, and approached the clerk with a deliberate, lumbering gait that would have spooked most men. The clerk himself, mousy and fair, was no exception.

"Just these?" asked the clerk.

"Ah," replied the driver. "Time for a midday pick me up, right?" He spoke in fluent Romanian, but with a strange, halting accent. The clerk focused on ringing up the purchases and not meeting the stranger's eyes. Something about the man was deeply unsettling.

A sum was murmured. Bills exchanged hands. The driver offered a smile that somehow didn't seem all that friendly, gathered his snacks and lumbered off towards the door. The clerk's eyes followed him as he went. It wasn't until the stranger had passed out of the shop that the boy uttered a sigh of relief and took his hand off the silent alarm.

"I'm going back to college," he muttered.

Outside the station, the cab driver was sifting through the change from his transaction and meandering up to a pay phone. He counted out the coins, plunk, plunk, plunk, and punched in a number from memory. It was five rings before anyone picked up.

"There might be a problem," he said into the receiver. He had shifted from his awkward Romanian dialect to a smoother, more natural tongue. Balkan Romani.

"What do you mean?" asked the driver's contact.

"I just picked up a pair of Americans and delivered them to the doorstep of your experiment. At least one of them is a werewolf and both of them might be witches. I think they aim to stop the girl's transformations."

The other end of the line was quiet for so long that the cabbie began to wonder if the call had been dropped. He was about to repeat himself when his contact rasped, "When?"

"An hour ago."

"And you just think to inform me now?"

"I wanted to make sure it was safe to contact you." The cabbie sounded a tad wounded. His friend grunted in frustration.

"Fine. I'll handle it. Tonight."

"You had better be careful. If the Cuza girl has outside help, she'll have more waiting in the wings."

"Tonight, Gavril."

The Cuza family hung as far back as they could get without leaving the room entirely. Which is generally a good policy when strangers use your apartment to conjure mystical forces. Oz, however, crouched a few feet away, eyes glued to Willow's every move. He wanted to on hand in case she needed anything. Someone to hold to magical chalice or... or whatever it was that would be going down. He didn't know.

The witch herself, meanwhile, had pushed what little furniture the Cuzas owned against the walls and sat in the center of the room, eyes closed. She was encircled by a ring of black votive candles, so chosen for the nature of a binding spell; it had been years before Willow was was comfortable working with the darker energies, but this was a dark working. No way around it. That being the case, she had chosen her tools very carefully. To her right lay a white handled dagger. To her left, a largeish chunk of citrine. The stench of dragon's blood, a favored incense of Willow's, mingled with the scents of the Cuza household, resulting in something just barely beyond definition. Directly in front of her, Willow had placed a woven necklace of Elena's atop a carefully carved wooden pentacle. Xander had made it for her. Buffy got crossbows for Christmas; Willow received portable points of power. Saving the world. Not that glamorous.

Willow was cautious. She took it slow. For fifteen or twenty minutes, she simply meditated, shutting out all distractions and getting in contact with the earth in this part of the world. She was a new presence here, something not recognized as right or welcome, and so she took her time. The air around her grew taut with power. They could all feel it, even old Gramma Cuza – who was, for once, blessedly silent. Oz grew restless. The longer Willow sat in her trance, flushing with energy, the more the wolf in him awoke. He could feel it sparking up his spine, itching to run, to howl, to hunt. Reacting to her magic. Staying still was murder.

At last, the witch exhaled, slowly and deliberately. She was ready to begin.

"In Hecate's name, she is bound to the flame. May it cast out the shift, may it save her the pain."

Because invoking Hecate never ended badly, Oz thought.

"Here there is no doubt, herein there lies no shame; by mighty Hecate, I cleave the wild from the tame." Willow's voice was even and rhythmic, but it quaked with a double timber Oz had never heard before. Her right hand picked up the dagger while her left moved to rest atop the crystal; it was instantly alight with some deeply buried, primal glow, and the light was moving through her. Willow began directing the dagger above Elena's necklace, cutting swatches of magic through the air and letting it settle on the object like dust. "May her nature be split in twain. May her soul be hers to claim. O, mighty Hecate," Willow thundered, "with these words, the beast I do restrain!"

With an audible pop, a pocket of magic exploded in the room, briefly blinding all but Willow herself. The candles were extinguished, and the little party found themselves blinking in the darkness.

"Huh," Oz remarked. His voice was shaking.

"Ever the wordsmith," Willow teased. Fumbling about, she carefully located her box of matches and struck one, illuminating three frightened faces and one high strung werewolf. Still crouched, he was breathing raggedly and looking bewildered. Their eyes locked. For the first time in six years, Willow saw straight through to the wolf, focused and ready. It was fierce. It was ancient. Maybe it was frightening, but she knew it; she knew every inch of it. Her stomach dropped out and the room began to spin, but Willow didn't look away. Not for an instant.

"Shit!"

That would be the sound of the match burning down to meet her fingertips.

There was a scrambling in the darkness. Oz uttered an oath as he knocked over a candle, but his hands soon closed around Willow's and liberated the box she clutched. With a snap, he struck a match and lit one of the candles still undisturbed, brow constricted. "You okay?" he asked.

"Yeah," Willow grumbled. "Fine. I don't think it even really burned me. Stupid short matches- oh!" Recalling the actual purpose of the general witchiness, she snatched up the freshly enchanted necklace and inspected it by fire light. "Elena, come here."

Obediently, the girl inched forward. She was wide-eyed and well spooked, and something squirmed guiltily in Willow. It wasn't her intent to go around scaring the daylights out of good little Catholic girls. So she smiled warmly and gently, as reassuring as she could be. "Have a seat, sweetheart."

Elena knelt beside the witch and the werewolf. Up close, Willow could see her trembling. So it was with considerable caution that she fashioned the necklace around Elena's neck. "How's that? Feel anything?"

Elena was quiet a moment, contemplating. "Feels warm," she breathed.

"Feel evil?"

"...no?"

"Good answer," Willow assured her. She gave the child a comforting pat on the shoulder. "It won't hurt you. Keep it on and it'll keep you safe. You won't turn as long as you wear it."

"Are you sure?"

"Pretty sure."

Elena did not look convinced.

"Will's pretty powerful," Oz assured her. "It'll work." Willow shot him a smile. He returned it, bracingly. If there had been a moment of strangeness, it had passed.

"Elena fix now?" Mr. Cuza asked. It was the first sentence he'd managed to utter since Willow had gotten her mojo on. Oz's smile faltered.

"Not exactly," he began. "She still needs to learn to control it on her own."

Mr. Cuza stared uncomprehendingly at them.

"The charm only suppresses the... the badness, but it's not, like, a long-term solution." Willow was trying, okay. "Oz will have to work with her to figure out what's going on, and how to control it. She might have to. Um. Leave town for a while."

More blank staring.

"Could you maybe translate?" Oz asked Elena. Looking cross, the girl fired off an explanation in rapid Romanian. Her grandmother shrieked and ducked into the bedroom to noisily resume her bawling. Oz pressed his lips together in a grim, patient smile.

"Awesome," Willow observed.

"Do I really have to leave?" Elena asked. Her father was sinking into the couch, one hand over his mouth. Oz hesitated. He wasn't the type to speak if he wasn't sure what to say.

"Only for a little while," Willow cut in. "Just long enough to get all trained up and zen. I'm sure it'll go fast. We're pretty good at figuring out weird otherworldly type stuff. Been doin' it for years."

"Your father can come with," Oz offered. "Or your grandmother. Whoever. And no one's going to make you do anything you don't want to do."

"We need think about," Mr. Cuza said, speaking slowly and deliberately. "Elena-"

"I want to go, papa," Elena told him. "I want – vreau sa merg cu ei, ori de cate ori sunt pregatiti. Nu pot sta aici. Nu cu intreg orasul gindire ma injura sau orice altceva. Nam o viata aice."

Her father looked scandalized. "Nu stim acestor oameni, Elena!"

"Cred ca putem sa ai incredere in ei!"

"Ooh, yay," Willow cooed. "More angry Latiny words." For lack of anything better to do, she set to releasing the residual magics hanging low over the room and cleaning up the mess she had made. Whatever else may be said of Willow, she is a conscientious house guest.

The argument ran a while. Glancing at her phone, Willow frowned; it was getting on in hours. Afternoon was lingering, but evening would soon be threatening, and frankly, she was starving. Sometimes casting left Willow ravenous. And besides, she would need to check in soon. Xander got kind of twitchy about that.

She sat with Oz, at something of a loss.

"What do we do with this?" She asked him quietly. Oz made a frustrated noise.

"Don't know," he muttered. "This isn't really going like I'd planned. We can't just sit here all night."

"Can't really kidnap her, either," was Willow's valuable insight. "What about the guy that called you out here in the first place?"

"Florin?"

"Yeah. Could he help convince them? Or maybe swing by, play translator?"

Oz considered this. "He isn't in the city, but maybe if I called..."

"It's something, anyway."

The hollering, mounting in intensity, didn't appear ready to resolve itself any time soon. Willow shifted awkwardly. Despite the language barrier, being present during another family's private disagreements felt intrusive and wrong. Oz seemed similarly uncomfortable, judging by the way he scratched at his ear. That was practically fidgeting for him.

"Maybe we should give them some time," he proposed.

"Yeah," Willow agreed. "Let them absorb it. This is a pretty big shock. It's only polite."

"Do you wanna go-"

"Oh god yes."

They scrambled for the front door. Willow didn't think the Cuzas even heard their explanation.