Dawn's true power revealed, secrets uncovered.
The Dawning of Faith
Chapter 25
"I'm gonna be the first Slayer ever to die in bed!"
"Have fun working with Willow; babe," Faith told her after the morning workout on Saturday, "it's good to see your shoulder better too."
"Thanks, I will." Dawn got a mischievous look on her face then, "Of course, I might sprain something. Think I could get you to massage it for me?" Faith grinned in reply.
"I live to serve; now I gotta go check on the newbies. A couple of the older ones are due for a training patrol pretty soon and I want to see how they're getting along. I'll likely just have lunch in the field with them today, we're going to tour the boneyards in daylight. Love you!" Faith called over her shoulder as she trotted off.
Dawn heaved a huge sigh of content, and went to clean up before seeing Willow.
"This is the book I've been searching for, Giles," Willow told him, "I think this one will let me come up with the spell I've been wanting. It's really going to be complex though, and maybe a little icky."
"Complex and icky are both tolerable, if regrettable," Giles said, "but does it look to be dangerous?"
"The only real danger would be if it didn't work, I think. Considering the nature of the spell, there might be serious consequences then. But when the time comes those involved can make up their own minds about it."
Dawn had taken a quick shower to rinse off the sweat, changed, and finished brushing her hair and pulling it into a ponytail. As she turned from her dresser to leave, a thought struck her, and she stuck the hairbrush in her back pocket.
"Hi Dawnie," Willow welcomed her, "lock the door please, then have a seat," Willow indicated a chair on the opposite side of the small table where she was seated.
"We'll begin with another tracing exercise, I'll port the pencil again, and you tell me where it went."
"Okay," Dawn agreed, reaching for Willow's hands. The pencil vanished.
"Where is it?"
"On your pillow."
"You can see it, can't you?" Willow slowly shook her head in chagrin. "Let's try it again."
The pencil was back in front of them, and then vanished. Dawn felt a flux in the air of the room.
"It's on the front desk at the coven retreat in Cornwall," Dawn said after a moment. Was that little bump I felt because you sent it farther?" Willow swallowed before she answered, but kept her face neutral.
"Yes, the farther you send, and the larger or more complex the object you send, the more energy you use. The surge in energy does feel like a bump, if you are attuned to it. On a really big 'port it can suck the air out of the area for just an instant or cause a surge of air pressure, depending on whether you are coming or going. And anybody can feel that, of course. I think we've proved you're a tracer. Are you ready to send something?"
Dawn nodded and produced her hairbrush. "I brought this just in case; I'm more familiar with this than I am a pencil. Was that a good idea?" Dawn asked.
"Sure was. We'll start slowly, you picture the object that you want to 'port, visualize the path that connects where it is to where you want it to be, and then see it there. You follow a map in your mind. It gets easier and quicker once you have sent over the same path. That is why I like to send to the coven from here. It's familiar; quicker, and easier. You should always conserve your energy when you can."
"Don't be upset if it doesn't work well at first, things may not go exactly where you intend them to. The mind has a way of seeing what it wants to see at times, or you might get distracted. But since you're a tracer, we can find them. I still don't know where my Hello Kitty slippers are. Now relax and let yourself feel connected to everything, just open yourself to the energy."
Dawn closed her eyes and took slow, deep, breaths.
"Everything is connected," Willow said softly, "you, me, Faith, Buffy, the trees and the rivers and the bones of the earth. You are a part of it all, and it is all a part of you, let it flow into you and continue on."
Willow opened her own perceptions and listened, and she could hear the magic of the universe greeting Dawn as she rode the currents of energy that flow through all things. It seemed to Willow like the magic was welcoming home a loved one, and she once again felt an electric tingle of excitement. "Flow along with everything, don't think, feel. Let me know when you believe that you are comfortable enough to send something."
Dawn felt a calm invade her, and felt herself fade into the very fabric of existence.
Willow watched quietly as the time slipped by, hoping that Dawn would make the needed connection, somehow knowing that she would.
"I'm ready," Dawn said upon opening her eyes.
"Good, we'll start slow. Send your brush to my bed, just visualize the path and see it there."
"Where on the bed?" Willow smiled.
"Just try and hit the bed Dawnie."
"Do you need to hold my hands?" Dawn asked.
"No point, I'm not a tracer. Just get comfortable." Dawn folded her hands in her lap, gazing at the hairbrush. Her eyes widened, and the brush vanished.
"Can you trace it?" Willow asked smiling, without turning to the bed.
"I can see it," Dawn said, puzzled. "The bed's right there." Willow turned around, and her breath caught in her throat, the brush was indeed right in the center of the bed.
"Please go and get it and we'll try something else," Willow asked her Dawn retrieved the brush, and waited expectantly for Willow's next instruction.
Willow was reeling, she had been confident that if Dawn had managed to move the brush at all that it would have appeared on Dawn's own bed because of her more intimate connection with it. But this…
"Okay, move it to my pillow, that's the one nearer the window." This time Willow turned to the pillow at once, and saw the faint shimmer as the brush appeared there. Willow 'ported the brush back to the table, more to help compose her thoughts than anything else.
"Do you feel tired at all?" she asked Dawn.
"Not tired, kind of … bubbly?"
"Good, put the brush back on your dresser, then."
"Done," Dawn announced.
"Are you sure?"
"No doubt about it," Dawn smiled.
"Where is your scythe?" Willow asked, smiling along with her.
"Locked in the chest in my room," Dawn answered. All of the bedrooms at "The Slayer Hilton" had weapons chests.
"Bring it, please," Willow asked.
Dawn started to stand, and Willow stopped her.
"I didn't say to go and get it, just bring it."
Dawn sat and composed herself. The scythe appeared on the table in a rush of air, and Willow burst out laughing.
"Did I do it wrong?" Dawn asked in concern.
"Oh Dawnie, you know you didn't do it wrong, I'm just happy! Not everyone who can send can bring."
"Why not, it's the same thing isn't it?"
"For you it is, yes. It's one of those understanding things. But I have to warn you, regardless of how good you are at this, or how good you may become, NEVER, attempt to bring living things. Not ever. We don't know precisely why, but it simply does not work. There have been witches and warlocks who could port half-way around the world, but not one of them was ever able to bring a living thing, not so much as a mouse. What you get is not at all what you wanted, and the lucky creatures and people arrived dead."
"It's because living things are always changing," Dawn said, "no matter how well you know someone, something is different about them than when you last saw them, even if it's only an emotional state. So it's impossible to do, same thing for any living creature." Willow's chin hit her chest.
"Oh. That's really kind of obvious, isn't it?" Dawn shrugged, and Willow shook off her daze with an effort. "Are you tired? That was more than a hairbrush," Willow asked.
"Not really tired, more like, calm, I guess."
"Good, that means that the tests were accurate, and that this magic is natural to you. It still drains you though; you'll start to feel it in a minute or so. I'll get you something to drink." Willow had a refrigerator in her room, which was one of the largest, to use for storing perishable potion ingredients. She went and got a canned smoothie for Dawn, and one for herself.
"Thanks," Dawn told her. "Why didn't you just 'port it?" Willow's face turned serious.
"Magic of this kind should never be used simply for convenience or recreation, Dawn. If you start down that path you might never find your way back. And if that happened it would destroy Faith, but not until after she'd killed me, I suppose. And you have to train your body as well as your magic."
"Dawn, you have a real gift for this magic, and that makes it even more important for you to keep it for when you really need it. I'm serious Dawn, if you abuse this it will cost you Faith, and everything else," Willow said earnestly.
That got through. Dawn remembered what had happened to Willow, rather vividly, in point of fact.
"Then I won't use it at all, without your permission, Will. Not until you say different," Dawn promised.
"Faith is a lucky woman," Willow told her. "Now finish your drink, we still have things to do today."
Dawn drank the smoothie, and had to admit that she felt a little restored.
"So in addition to magical energy, this sort of thing uses your physical strength as well, right?" Dawn asked.
"Yes, but I have to tell you that there are a lot of witches who would have been drained by bringing something as large as your scythe. Your connection to this magic is most intimate, and most unusual."
"What do we do next?" Dawn asked her.
Willow went and brought two candles to the table and then lit one of them with a match.
"Move the flame to the other candle," Willow told her.
Dawn's eyes flickered, and it was done.
"Split the flame, light the extinguished one from the lit one, but don't put that one out."
Two candles burned on the table.
Willow was in shock. She hid it well, but her nerves were screaming with the thought that raged through her mind.
Willow extended her hand.
"Put your hairbrush in my hand." Willow was taking a chance here, it was entirely possible that Dawn would literally put it in her hand.
Willow's hand felt the weight of the arriving brush.
"Tired?" she asked Dawn.
"Not exactly, I have a kind of contented feeling," Dawn told her.
"Good, relax for a bit," Willow told her.
Willow went to her desk and took out a piece of paper and wrote something on it. She put the paper into an envelope, and wrote "Rachel" on it.
"Feeling okay, Dawnie?" she asked.
"Five by five," promised Dawn, and Willow grinned at her.
Willow held a pencil in her hand.
"Put this on my desk," she said as she tossed the pencil into the air.
She turned to see the pencil appear on her desk. Feeling a rising joy, Willow walked to a window and looked down on the drive in front of the house.
"You remember the car that we took to the club?" she asked.
"Sure, the big one," Dawn answered, "it's a bit of a pig to drive, but comfortable."
"Put it in front of the house…"
Willow staggered as the air puffed from the room for an instant. She regained her balance and looked down on the shining Lincoln.
"Tired?" she asked Dawn.
"Some, yeah," Dawn admitted.
"Okay, just one thing more, and then we'll go for ice cream," Willow promised. "I need to pee first though." She went into the bathroom, and sent a text…
"Rachel, go to the front desk. Willow" she pressed send, and then slid her pants down and sat.
She really did have to pee.
The phone vibrated.
"K I'm there," appeared on the screen at the press of her thumb.
Willow finished up, returned to Dawn and carelessly tossed a red envelope onto the table.
"Send this to the front desk at the coven retreat," Willow said casually.
The envelope vanished.
"I might need a couple minutes here," Dawn told Willow. She drew several deep breaths, stretched, and then looked at Willow. "What now?"
Willow struggled to keep her feet, her head was swimming, and she could scarcely keep from shouting aloud.
A red envelope appeared on the desk at the coven retreat with "Rachel" written on it in Willow's familiar hand. Rachel opened it and read…
"If you can read this, we have an Avatar."
A/N: Dawn being an Avatar has nothing to do with the movie of that title. This usage predates that, and refers to the living embodiment of a principle, not a computer image or visual representation as in a chat room.