Giles had more issues seeing than he'd imagined he'd have. He knew it would be stressful, but he found the lack of depth, headache inducing. After knocking over his glass of water on a seven thousand year old scroll, and a five hundred year old book off the table breaking the binding apart, within a minute of each other, he'd excused himself to his room on the other side of the kitchen. Buffy and Spike could take care of Dawn and research this Edith character.
"Are you sure this one isn't her?" Dawn asked after showing Buffy the twenty-third Edith she'd found a sketch of.
"Sorry." Buffy returned to the book in front of her hoping this one would have the answer but she'd been getting more and more anxious as the night wore on. Nervous energy pumped through her and she didn't think she could sit still any longer. "How's Xander been handling patrolling with just Willow lately?"
Spike turned the page of what amounted to an otherworldly mug book. "They don't patrol together. Xander goes to whatever bar will serve him while Willow patrols. The usual is she takes the brightly lit areas while I take the cemeteries and what not. Since the only reason to patrol the dark areas is to catch the baddies on their way to bed, it's not as important. But we need to find out about this not corporeal corporeal woman, sooner rather than later here I am with you." He'd been watching Buffy out of the corner of his eye all night and he noticed every kill Willow made, four in total. Buffy glowed with the energy Willow sent her. Her skin pinked up, and she went from dragging to electrified in three hours. "Want to spar? Even if Willow hasn't gotten to the basement, we could have a moonlit go at it."
"Patrol sounds better." Buffy stood up and stretched her limbs. "I know we need to figure out who Edith is but if I look at one more drawing I'll go cross-eyed. You coming?"
"Can't leave the Nibblet and Giles by themselves. Not all nasties need an invite." Spike stood up. "You should stay here with your li'l sis, the Watcher, and these books. I'll patrol tonight and tomorrow we'll work out a better system."
"You can protect them can't you? I need to get out before I burst." Buffy talked as she walked out the door.
Spike watched her go with strained jaw and neck muscles, but schooled his expression when he turned back to Dawn. "You learnt that location spell Willow wanted you to, yeah?"
"Yeah. I mastered that a month ago. Who am I looking for?" Dawn asked as she got up and opened the pantry to get supplies.
"Willow. Can't have big sis running into her can we?"
"That would be a disaster. Willow without the glamour doesn't look much like Willow and if Buffy attacked her… do we even know what would happen if Willow got that hurt? To Buffy I mean?" She pulled the ingredients she needed and laid them on the table.
"Nothing good." Spike helped Dawn set up what she needed since he was familiar with the spell.
"I'll get the alarm ready too." Dawn went back to the pantry when Spike nodded in agreement.
Once the spells were done, Spike headed to the Magic Box, where Dawn located Willow's essence. He found her in the loft with some salvaged couch cushions, throwing a crystal ball in the air and catching it as she lay on her back.
"What do you want Spike?"
"To get you somewhere Buffy isn't likely to go. She's patrolling right now and if she gets a bit nostalgic when she walks by here, we don't want her seeing you au naturel." He held his hand out to her but then thought twice about it and took two steps back. "Should train you up anyway."
"Don't you think that's too risky? Touching me is dangerous enough, but if I got hold of you, and you could get me off this time, you'd be dust." She stood up with more grace than any creature he'd ever seen.
"Seems I like a challenge more than a sure win, so let's give it a go. See if you're as easy as I think you'll be."
"You know I kill anyone I touch for more than a second or two and there's a way not to do that. I could, uh, you know… demons could survive, humans never could. But I can't bring myself to do that. That's too far from who I am." With her glamour completely down, Spike could see her emotions ripple under her glossy white skin. Little waves of color that his enhanced vision picked up with ease. Humans would be affected on an unconscious level.
"Willow? You're a smart bird. Haven't you figured out that sex is a need and there's nothing to be ashamed of with that need? That people who shame you for being sexual just want to repress you? I was born in the bleeding Victorian era and I know it. How is it that you haven't figured it out and you live now?" Spike stuck his hands in his pockets, pulled out a pocket Kama Sutra, and tossed it at her. "You need to get used to the idea that you need sex more than most others. You literally need it to survive if you don't want to kill so much. And not just for you but Buffy too. I will not let you ruin her because of your prudishness."
"I think I'd rather train right now." She tossed the book back to him.
"Then let's get a move on. There's one place Buffy would never look, and I know it's empty." Spike started down the stairs.
When Willow followed, she said, "Your old crypt?"
"And that's all you've used your big brain for tonight, figuring out the obvious? For shame, pet."
"Sorry Spike but I've never killed with my bare hands before. Even if it's just evil demons and vampires, it feels wrong, like I'm betraying them, betraying me, and everyone I care about too. But it's a rush at the same time. And sometimes I have a craving for a human. Haven't acted on that, but the urge is there. That scares me to death, and it's a bit busy in the noggin these days."
"Would you believe me if I said, I know what you're going through?" He held the back door open for her.
"No."
"I swear that head of yours is filled with all the wrong information. You might be able to remember the things you read, but knowing when you've been fed bunk information seems outside your wheelhouse." He shook his head as she scowled at him before they headed to the crypt.
The big yellow demon punched Buffy in the face again without her even trying to block it. The pain and blood, affirmation of life. She needed that proof a bit more tonight than she had last night. But she'd had enough and chopped its head off with a single stroke.
Since waking from the coma, Buffy knew something dark had curled inside her body and brain, and made her its home. She didn't feel anything, and while she knew how to make her eyes wrinkle when she smiled, she didn't feel it. And she didn't feel it when she forced amusement at something she knew she'd find cute before, but didn't anymore.
"That won't help you." The voice sounded like wind tangled in chimes.
"Edith. What would you know about it?" Buffy marched away but Edith appeared in front of her and Buffy thinking she could walk right through ended up on her ass when she collided into Edith. Edith's eyes looked at her like that old doll Buffy had when she was six. Eyes that seemed to both not see anything but also saw everything they shouldn't at the same time. Those eyes gave her chills just as much now with Edith as when she was six and her mother had passed down that creepy abomination of a toy.
"I know more about it than you think. I only just got released from a prison of sorts. So mind your manners with me, please. We've both dealt with hell at the whim of someone else. I'm just looking out for you. I want you to have the peace you deserve. To sleep easy because the world is safe. Safe like that place lied and said already existed here. Told you that your friends and family were okay when they weren't." Edith held her hands clasped in front of her in a way that suggested she was reciting like children did in those old movies. "I will never lie to you, and I will always tell you the exact nature of what's in your stars. We'll navigate those waters together."
"And then what? Sit and have tea?" Buffy got to her feet and brushed the grass off her backside.
"I don't like tea anymore. Had my fill for a lifetime, I'm afraid." Edith faded for a moment before once again appearing solid. "Shall we begin?"
"I still don't know if I can trust you." Buffy walked around Edith this time and kept going, ignoring the being calling after her.. She continued to ignore Edith, even as she attempted to block her path again. Buffy walked around her once more determined not to interact with the being until they knew who or what Edith was.
Buffy's resolve held until Edith called out, "Willow brought you back from the dead. The others helped, but it was Willow. She knew you might be in heaven, and she brought you back despite that. She decided that they needed a Slayer more than you needed peace."
"What did you say?" Buffy turned and scrutinized Edith with her bologna curls and lace trimmed dress. "Willow wouldn't do that."
"But she would and she did. Sacrificed her humanity since you'd been dead for four months. She's a demon now. No human could withstand more than a few seconds of her touch and she takes on bits and pieces of those she kills while passing that energy on to you. To keep you here full of life and whole of body, she feeds every night. She made that sacrifice to rip you out of the peace of the seventh ring of heavenly dimensions." Edith sounded like Alice from the Disney cartoon, scolding a Wonderland creature for not making sense.
"Willow would never do that." Buffy walked away again but a wall of Ediths blocked her path.
"I can prove it. Go to Spike's old crypt, she's there training with him, learning how to harness her demon strength and how to live like a demon." The Ediths disappeared slowly, their doll eyes the last to disappear.
As if fate decided for her, Buffy was already in the right cemetery and the walk to Spike's crypt took no time at all.
"Stop lollygagging, Tara. We've got a lot of ground to cover." Anya was getting annoyed with her own voice. She hated sounding like this, but Tara had never been on a hike longer than a mile before, and they had to get through a lot more before making it to Clay, the next demonic stop in their quest.
"Couldn't the driver have gotten us closer?" Tara asked as she tried to keep up with Anya's brisk stride.
"Looks like they're keeping even more of a distance than before, and considering Clay's not exactly friendly, I don't blame them. The only people we'll see from here out will be his subjects." Anya stopped to take a sip from her canteen.
"Subjects?" Tara asked.
"Clay keeps the bodies and souls of the ones that don't pass the trials. Locked in his domain for eternity, desperate for escape they have no hope of ever getting. They're not decaying or anything but they'll try to warn us off. Won't touch us though. They aren't able to touch anyone without decaying and that's a hell no one will risk. So hurry. The sooner we get this over with the better." Anya walked even faster now.
"But Clay sounds like such a nice name. Like an old man with paper skin and a warm smile for every," Tara tripped, "one."
"His name isn't Clay. He's just made of clay so that's what I've been calling him for a millennia."
As Tara got to her feet, she said, "Do you think that might be why he doesn't like you?"
"Well I had to call him something, didn't I? Pretentious bastard thinks he's above being named."
Anya was so far ahead now, Tara had to yell to be heard. "Can we not call him Clay when we see him? And is there any way we can skip seeing him altogether?"
"If the Loa sent us here, then it's too important to skip. And I just hope he doesn't send us to Skip. Getting all the pieces to get into his dimension would be impossible." Anya waited for Tara to catch up.
"There's a demon named Skip? Can we see him instead. He has to be nicer than Clay." Tara gasped for air as she looked over the rough terrain.
"Skip's agendas run deep and crossing him is worse than failing Clay's trials. I don't like the idea of being on literal fire till the end of time, do you? Hopeless is better than hopeless and on fire." Anya could see the pools of sweat all over Tara's clothes. "We'll take a fifteen minute break under that tree, but we can't waste too much time. We only have so much in supplies."
"Clay it is. But we aren't calling him that. Please?" Tara fell to the ground as soon as she felt the shade.
"I promise I won't call him that." Anya sighed as she sat next to Tara. "Save your strength and stop talking so much. It'll keep your mouth from drying out as fast and you'll be able to walk longer."
"Why don't you have that problem?"
"Over a thousand years of walking. Demon or no, I had to stay in shape for the cases that landed me on a long journey to get the wish. Now shut up." Anya handed Tara some water and when Tara looked like she would thank her, Anya said, "Zip it."