The trip to their little demon friend's apartment had not yielded the Books of Ascension, but Buffy wasn't convinced that it had been a waste of time. Considering her new suspicions, however, she would have preferred that it was.
It was easy to lose Faith after they left the place—so easy, in fact, that it seemed like Faith was trying to lose her too. Once she was gone, Buffy doubled back. Demonic or not, the sight of the prone, blood-covered body turned her stomach. Screwing up her face, she approached him and examined the scene more closely than Faith's impatience had allowed before. Within seconds, she spotted a bloody dagger lying on the floor near the body.
[o]
Angel had just taken out a container of blood when he heard a knock at the door. "Come in!" he called, quickly putting the blood back in the fridge. The door opened, and Buffy came in, looking gravely serious and holding an object that had been wrapped carefully in paper towels. "What's up?" he asked, his brow furrowing.
"I think we have a problem," she said. He walked over to her and she held out the wrapped object to him. He took it, frowning, and she sank onto the sofa and pressed her forehead into her hands. Feeling apprehensive, he pulled the paper towels away to reveal a knife covered in blood. The scent of it made his eyes widen.
"This is the same blood that was on Faith's hands last night," he said. He looked at Buffy, who, rather than appearing surprised, seemed merely resigned and perhaps a little sad.
"It came from a demon who wanted to sell us the Books of Ascension. Faith and I went to find him today. He was dead and the books were gone."
"It was her," said Angel. "She's working for the Mayor." He put the dagger down on the coffee table and joined Buffy on the sofa. They sat there in silence for a long time.
"What happened?" asked Buffy in a small voice. "What did we do wrong?"
"I don't know." There was no anger in his tone. Or bitterness. He felt only a hollow sense of loss and that he should have seen this coming. It was almost like grieving.
"I fought alongside her for months. I don't exactly like her right now because of what she tried to pull last night, but this?"
And Angel thought he had gotten through to her. That he'd made her want to change. Apparently all he'd really managed to do was make her want him.
[o]
Giles was beginning to despair in the suspicion that his entire library would prove worthless in their quest to learn more about the Mayor. Faith hadn't been able to tell them much; perhaps she hadn't been convincing enough as a double agent to make him trust her. The files to which Willow had tried so diligently to gain access had also turned up empty. With any luck, though, Buffy would be able to procure these Books of Ascension, as she and Faith had recently gone to do, and then, perhaps, they would be able to make some headway at last.
He was pulled abruptly from these musings, however, by a yell from the stacks. He looked around, alarmed, to see Wesley running out from amid the shelves. "Mr. Giles, the library is under attack!" he cried dramatically. "We must arm ourselves at once!"
"Under attack?" repeated Giles, incredulous. "In the middle of a school day?" He looked back at the place where Wesley (who was now halfway to the book cage and, more specifically, the weapons cabinet it contained) had appeared, and his mouth opened in astonishment, before lifting in a smile. "Aziz! What a surprise! Good Lord, how long has it been?"
Wesley skidded to a halt and only managed not to fall over by seizing the door of the book cage for support. Having finally managed to steady himself, he looked around in utter bewilderment. Giles's greeting had been directed at the rather sinister-looking dark mage who had just appeared next to him out of nowhere in the stacks and caused his panic.
"Too long, Rupert Giles," said the mage in a deep, resonating voice. Most of his face was obscured by black cloth, but his glowing yellow eyes seemed to be crinkled in a friendly smile. Or perhaps an amused one, for they flickered briefly to Wesley before he said, "I apologize for the fright I gave your associate."
"Oh, that's quite all right," said Wesley, going red. "And I apologize for screaming bloody murder," he added in a self-disgusted undertone.
"And how is Farah?" asked Giles, sparing Wesley from further embarrassment.
The smile in Aziz's eyes grew more pronounced. "She is now expecting our third child. In fact," he drew closer, pulling what seemed to be an ordinary leather wallet from a pocket in his robes, "that is why I am here. I was summoned to town and heard you were living here now." He stopped at Giles's side and opened the wallet to reveal pictures of Aziz, Farah, and two small children. "This is our son, Haidar, and our daughter, Atiya," he said, his voice full of affectionate pride.
"They're beautiful. Congratulations."
"What can I ever do to repay the debt I owe you for the joy that has come into my life since you helped Farah's path cross with mine?"
"It was my pleasure, I assure you," said Giles. "Now, er," he went on curiously, "you say you were summoned to town?"
"I was. Your mayor has requested my services."
Both Watchers went rigid. "For what, exactly? If you don't mind my asking, that is," said Giles.
"He wishes me to remove the soul of a vampire he intends to have for his ally," said Aziz conversationally.
"No!" shouted Wesley, alarmed and infuriated by the implication. He would not let it happen! Friend of Giles's or not, if this man or demon or whatever he was had agreed to remove Angel's soul, then Wesley would do whatever he had to do to prevent him from succeeding.
Aziz looked at him calmly. "This man does not want me to fulfill the Mayor's request?"
"Nor do I," said Giles, shooting Wesley a quelling look to keep him from interfering. "The Mayor is a very dangerous enemy, and the vampire in question happens to be a—an ally of mine in his current ensouled condition." He had come close to calling Angel a friend, but found that he could not quite do it.
"I have already agreed to perform this magic, though the idea of assisting any enemy of yours gives me little pleasure."
"Aziz," said Giles very seriously, "if you were to, perhaps, make it appear as though the necessary magic had been performed without actually doing it, I would consider your debt repaid."
Aziz considered him for a moment, then nodded. "It shall be done."
[o]
Buffy and Angel were still sitting side-by-side on his couch when the phone rang, jolting them out of the daze into which they had been plunged by the discovery of Faith's betrayal. Angel got up to answer it and Buffy followed, if only for something to do.
"Hello?"
"Angel." It was Giles, and he sounded urgent. Angel quickly pushed the speaker button just in time for the next sentence to blare out across the apartment. "The Mayor is trying to relieve you of your soul."
"What?!" yelped Buffy, a hand shooting out to clutch one of Angel's, and he looked just as alarmed as her.
"Yes, well," Giles continued, "it just so happens that he went through the wrong channels in his attempts to accomplish it. I expect you'll be hearing from a mage soon, Angel. His name is Aziz, and he's an old friend of mine. He's agreed to only give the appearance of removing your soul."
"You want me to play along," Angel realized.
"The Mayor obviously wants you for something. It could be that he'll tell you more than he's told Faith."
"But Faith's in on it!" said Buffy.
"What?" asked Giles sharply. Another voice echoed his, and they guessed that he had put his phone on speaker as well, and that Wesley was there with him.
"She killed the demon with the books and took them, and—oh!" She gasped, her eyes round as coins. "She tried to seduce Angel last night!" Her grip on Angel's hand became distinctly possessive as she said it. "She doesn't know the curse is different now. What if she was doing it on the Mayor's orders to make him lose his soul?"
"And she thought that would have been perfect happiness?" Angel muttered scornfully.
"What an absurdly arrogant presumption," they heard Wesley snort in reply. "Has she any idea how rare—"
"Quite," Giles cut in impatiently, "but that's hardly the point. If Faith has indeed turned against us and the books are with the Mayor, then it becomes even more crucial for Angel to use this opportunity discover all he can. It could be our only chance."
"When's this going down, Giles?" asked Buffy.
"It can't be much longer now. Aziz sounded like he planned on setting off for it very soon."
"Thanks for the heads up," she said.
"You're welcome, and good luck." There was a click, and the call ended. Angel put the phone back in its cradle and turned to Buffy. They stared at each other for a few seconds, letting the weight of everything sink in.
"Are you sure you can do this?" asked Buffy.
"I am," he said, "but are you?"
"What do you mean?" she asked.
"Buffy, I'm going to have to act like I don't have a soul."
"I know," she said.
"Faith and the Mayor have never met me without a soul," he said, trying to figure out how best to explain this. "If Faith is really far enough gone to do this…," he broke off again, frustrated. "She probably thinks the only reason I turned her down is my soul. If that's the case, then the only way to convince her that I don't have it…"
Buffy's eyes widened. She didn't need him to finish the sentence. She drew a deep breath and let it out again, trying to stay level-headed. "Do what you have to do," she said. Then she let out a squeak of hysterical laughter. "God, this information had better be worth it."
I've always wondered how Giles found out what that mage bloke was up to, and the most logical explanation I could think of was that mage bloke wanted to show him pictures of his kids. ^_^ Obviously, Wesley wasn't there in canon, and the only reason for his being there in this (besides my desire to use him for comic relief) could be that he and Giles get along slightly better in this than canon, so he might reasonably have been hanging around the library more often, and so would have been present for mage bloke's appearance. Also, the names of mage bloke and his family. According to the episode's shooting script, mage bloke was speaking Arabic when he did the fake soul-removing spell, so I just found a bunch of Arabic names with cool meanings. Aziz means power, Farah means joy, Haidar means lion, and Atiya means gift.