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Blood Rites

Nan

AU, continues from The Blood Is the Life. As Spike and Buffy try to hold onto their partnership and their love, recently unsouled Spike tries to secure his position as self-proclaimed Master Vampire of Sunnydale...against the wishes of The Powers That Be and the Slayer's ancient mandate. Magic, new arrivals, old friends (and enemies), dreams, visions, e-Bay, tribute blood, and cookies all play a part in the tense give and take between vampire priorities and human necessities.

Disclaimer: All is Joss's. None is mine. No profit. Just more Spikejoy for everyone.

Chapter 15: Convergence

Dawn took one glance at the map Willow held, with its single red dot, and grabbed Buffy's arm. "Let me do it." Cutting off whatever protest Buffy was about to make, Dawn persisted, "He won't freak, with me. I'm going." Still, she waited until her non-question was answered by Buffy's turning aside: tacit permission.

Mike the imperturbable was pacing. He knew, but he wouldn't say: at a guess, he'd promised not to. Freakin' big secret: Spike was hid out at abandoned Casa Mike, all of a block away. Mike responded to Dawn's indignant glance with an apologetic dip of his head and didn't say anything, which he was very good at.

Dawn sprinted the distance in a couple of minutes, then hung up outside, trying to figure the best approach to a suicidally depressed vampire. The usual, she decided: be annoying enough to get him talking and then wing it from there.

She opened the door. Cautiously, in case he was right inside, since it was still light out.

Once she'd determined Spike hadn't returned to the factory last night, Buffy had wanted him to come back under his own steam, of his own choice, and forbidden a direct hunt, opting for putting verbal thumbscrews to Mike, instead. Only when it was plain that was going nowhere had she given the OK for Willow to do a locator spell.

Casa Mike: practically next door, Casa Spike having been fire-bombed and burned to rubble. Not hard to interpret: he could have come home, but hadn't. The whole invite mixup, maybe. Didn't want to wake up a rightful resident at five in the morning to let him stumble in, formally invited. They'd both been pretty drunk, according to Mike, and Dawn didn't doubt it. The uppers, too, which ensured a hard crash, coming down. He'd likely still be asleep.

He wasn't sacked out on the couch in the dusty living room. He wasn't in the kitchen in back, either. Nor tucked up in any of the ground-level closets. There was a stairway up and a stairway down. On a hunch, she took the stairway down, flicking the light switch futilely (power finally cut off for non-payment, or maybe just a blown bulb), then taking the steps sideways, bent low to look.

He was sitting on the floor in the inside corner, farthest from the high windows. Back bent, arms slack at his sides, head bowed right into the corner. Made Dawn think of a punished doll. And not expecting anybody to see him that way, so that pose, that was just for him. The way he most felt like being. Fairly grim, she thought, approaching at a cautious sidle in case he was asleep.

But he wasn't. "Bit, you ever do like I said, get Red to fix you some different anchor?"

She leaned against the wall where she could see his profile. "Nope. Not gonna, either."

He didn't move or open his eyes. At least he wasn't rocking, and sounded sane. "You should. Nearly was gone a couple times last night, never thought till after about how you'd be tied into it. Sorry. For not thinking."

She slid down against the wall and hugged her knees. Taking a page from Mike's book, she said nothing. If Spike felt like talking, she wanted to listen. Sometimes silence drew better than questions.

"'F you're hangin' on 'cause you think that'll make me careful, it don't work like that. I don't think it out that far. Can't, I guess. Don't, anyway. So don't you consider me, that don't signify. You just consider you. 'F you don't want to talk to Red about it, some reason, I'll do it."

"When are you coming home?"

Long silence. Dawn waited. "Dunno," he said finally in a colorless voice. "Some time, I expect. When I'm wanted for something or other."

"You're wanted now, Spike. They're having a meeting about what to do about the sweep, tonight. They--"

Spike interrupted quietly, "I'm no use for that," like it was an obvious fact past arguing.

"Why? On account of the soul?"

"Oh, I can talk well enough," Spike responded, with the first edge of bitterness he'd allowed himself. "Just can't do nothing about it, not of any use. An' she'd want to know why, always wanting to know why, and that's not on the agenda. Not far's I'm concerned."

"I want to know why. You might have noticed," Dawn mentioned. "Mike's sitting in, so you don't have to worry about giving anybody vampire cooties. That's already all taken care of."

"Let Mike sort it, then. He's better off if I don't mix in."

"He's pacing. Doing his trademark strong, silent routine. Waiting for you."

Spike looked around sharply, yellow-eyed. "He tell you I'd laired up here?"

"The soul of discretion," Dawn denied, hands lifted virtuously.

"How, then? Oh. Had Red hunt me. Expect that Rayne, he can do that too, now…."

"Murder at sundown, news at eleven?"

"Got enough of my kit now, likely track me easy." Another long silence: working out the likelihood of an attack in force, here in this basement, as soon as it was dark. Another fire-bombing maybe, Dawn thought. "Have to have that talk with Red, I guess," Spike decided, and stiffly unfolded, bracing a hand on the wall. Still had the brass bangle on his right wrist, she noticed. But the other one was gone.

Following along, Dawn figured it out far enough to know the tricky part wasn't getting him to come--it would be getting him to stay. Whatever was coming, he'd want to draw it away, have it be him alone. And the necessary preliminary to that was cutting her loose: a strong enough reason to make him face the dreaded why.

Of course it wouldn't go that way, but if she could follow his thought, she could get ahead of him and block him when it would matter. It was enough, now, to have started him moving.

Except that he opened the front door and walked right out into the late sunlight. No preparation, no blanket, nothing. Dawn was frozen in the doorway, waiting for him to burst into flame.

He didn't. Catching a quick gulp of breath, Dawn saw he was unhurriedly aiming for the speckled shade of the nearest tree that still had most of its leaves. Slamming the door behind her, she sprinted to the tree and grabbed him there in a strangling hug.

"Dammit, give a girl some warning! You just scared me--"

"Sorry," he responded reflexively. "Didn't think about it. Just how it is now."

She somehow kept herself from saying the dreaded why, just held on harder, and was rewarded with his cheek against her hair.

"Sorry, Bit. Didn't mean to scare you. Didn't think…."

"You owe me seventy-five cents," Dawn announced in a dire voice, pulling back to look him in the eyes (currently pale blue).

He did the head tilt, puzzled, waiting for an explanation.

"Every time you say 'sorry,' you owe me a quarter."

"Says who?"

"Says me." Studying his face, she touched his cheek with experimental fingertips. Warm. And so were his hands. Maybe a little pink--she couldn't be sure. "New parlor trick?"

He shrugged. "Just noticed, is all. Some of it…." He frowned, searching for words. "Think some of it just…radiates. Like I'm channeling it. And the rest heals, fast as it burns. Long as I'm fed up good, anyway. Or that's how it's seemed. Long as the sun's low and I don't push it too far. Feels something like running a fever, as best I recall, which isn't much. Minute or so, though, it's gone."

She laid her palm on his forehead, then took both his hands. Cool again. "Even for a vamp, you're a freak," she reported, and he smiled slightly, waiting for her to finish her inspection. In his way, quieter than Mike…and that was very strange. She wasn't sure she approved. "What's the next mark?"

"Tree at the corner should be in range. If it's not, I'll tuck into that shadow by the big bush." He pointed, and Dawn confirmed the strategy. They zigzagged together from mark to mark, Dawn resisting the impulse to run, to drag him. He kept a steady pace, and she kept hold of his hand, feeling the heat build and then dissipate.

"This is so neat!" she couldn't resist telling him when they reached the large shadow of the house that had formerly been the neighbor of Casa Spike. "Think we can make the back porch all in one go?"

Spike considered the distance: the whole width of the yard of Casa Summers, plus a little. "From the hedge, maybe."

"Wait--I'll get a blanket, something. I want to see if you can do it. If you can't, just drop and I'll cover you up till you're cool again, OK?" Not waiting for any argument, she dashed to the break in the hedge, then on to the back porch and hammered on the door until Buffy came to let her in. Running for the stairs, she called, "Everybody onto the sidewalk, you gotta see this! No, Mike: you stay! I'll tell you afterward." Grabbing the chenille spread off her bed, she raced down, grabbing up ends and fistfuls of trailing fringe to avoid tripping herself, ordering, "Quiet, and watch the back hedge, OK?"

Dropping off the back porch, she went four long paces out into the yard and shook out the spread, figuring if Spike got into trouble, it would be nearer to the house than to the hedge. She looked around to check that the audience was in position with a clear line of sight, then called, "OK, Spike, I'm ready! Come on."

He came through the hedge at the same unhurried stroll, smiling at her as he passed, went up the porch steps, and then locked there, in front of the open door.

She'd forgotten about the disinvite.

Dumping the spread, Dawn ran, took the steps in two jumps, and whirled in the kitchen, blurting breathlessly, "Spike, come in, for God's sake!"

He came inside vamp-fast and was in the hall before she could turn to face him. Definitely pink, this time. "Cut it a bit fine," he commented, hugging himself nervously.

"Sorry--I forgot!"

"Down to fifty cents, now: debit you a quarter."

"Bet I make it back within fifteen minutes," Dawn riposted, going out to retrieve the spread. And encountered the audience, spilling into the yard via the driveway, too impatient to get an explanation to circle back through the house. Pulling up successive heavy drapes of chenille and clutching them against her, Dawn reported Spike's theory, finishing by fixing Buffy with a gimlet stare. "Now I've told you all there is to tell. Don't ask him why. Don't ask him why anything. And every sorry costs him a quarter, and I'm keeping count, so don't bankrupt the corporation, all right? You were right, Buffy: don't push him. Wait and let him come to you. And that's really good advice, and I hope you take it. Because otherwise, he's gonna be gone and you're gonna be sorry, and we're talking major money here."

Clutching the armload of spread, she led the parade back into the house.

*********

Spike was absently patting pockets for a pack of smokes and the lighter and there was nothing, not so much as a matchbook, when he found all the Scoobies gathered around him, smiling in goofy benevolence: fucking puppy had done a trick. Well, he was having none of that, thank you very much. Nobody here he wanted to talk to excepting Red, to get the thing done.

Drunk had cleared nearly all the fog away, he could make her out plain, and was just about to explain about Bit, what had to be done, when Willow informed him brightly, “You’re bronze.”

And the poncy habit kicked in from God knew where and he responded blankly, “Excuse me?”

“You used to be all silver and shadow,” the witch continued, formulating a thesis. “Mirrored, almost. Taking the image of whatever was around you, none of your own. Quicksilver, the cool liquid metal that’s slow death to the touch. That’s why the Mad Hatter was mad: mercury poisoning used to be an occupational disease of hat-makers. But now you’re bronze, a blended metal. Yet one thing all through.”

Head reared back, Spike considered her sternly. “Have you gone completely ‘round the bloody bend?”

“No, you have. And back again.”

Complete nutcase bonkers. Or, he thought uneasily, maybe it was him. That stopped him, made him uncertain. Backing against the staircase wall, he reached out a hand. “Bit…?”

She came to him, his touchstone, quick and graceful. Casually folding fingers into his braceleted hand, she slid between, her back to him to face the confusion and keep it from him. Dawn told the witch, “You’re freaking him. Could we maybe do the fun metal folklore some other time?”

From the back, Buffy’s humorless voice suggested they all reconvene in the front room again, but that was nothing to do with him anymore and he stayed where he was until Willow leaned to start after Harris. Then Spike stepped into her path. “Need you to do a thing.”

“We can talk about it,” Willow offered amiably, “after--”

“Now.”

Willow settled, and after an assessing glance, Dawn evidently found the level of weird acceptable and released his hand. Not about to just leave them to it, though: heading into the kitchen, Dawn commented, “He wants to cut me off. Dawnectomy. I say, first, do no harm. Leave things as they are. So there’s nothing to talk about.”

“’S my soul,” Spike argued, past Willow. “Don’t want you hitched to it. Piece you have, you stole, never asked, just latched onto it. I should have rights what’s hitched up to it or not.”

Dawn leaned out, just her head and the hanging scarf of hair, to say, “I didn’t hear any complaints at the time.”

“Doesn’t signify. Connect up to your sis or whatever, up to you, that side of it.” Because the Slayer was no safe connection neither, and that realization had so much that came with it, it hung him up with his eyes shut to not be totally distracted. Hold to the point. He told Willow, “’S a waste, otherwise, an’ she’s just being provoking. Most things, I’d let her have her way. Not this. Needs doing, and needs doing now. Her holding on ain’t gonna change nothing that happens, except to get her hurt too. Cut her loose.”

“You do,” Dawn warned the witch, “and I’ll make you sorry.”

Willow said, “I really don’t like being in the middle of you two arm-wrestling. And I have no idea how to go about doing what you want, Spike. I can loose souls or restore them--I never read anything that tells about de-fractioning them. Giles? A second opinion needed here.”

When the Watcher came mooching out of the front room, hands in pockets, all smooth reserved surface, Spike was almost as startled as if it’d been Angel. It rearranged reality: not anything he thought about, just something he knew beyond question--that the Watcher was gone. That taking care of the Slayer fell solely to Spike now. That guarding her back wasn’t good enough anymore--Spike had to scout ahead, too, and clear the way before her. The task he’d fallen down on, been inadequate to.

The last of the heat dissipated, leaving him cold and still in his surprise.

Regarding him, Giles remarked quietly, “Hello, Spike. I’ve been here several days, but I gather you weren’t in a position to notice. Oddly enough, I came for you. Because of Ethan.”

Spike backed against the wall again but Giles touched him anyway, setting a hand on his shoulder. Spike vibrated under it, with noplace left to back to. Couldn’t just swat the ponce. He was at a loss. He felt his features shift aspect. His throat was tight with the beginnings of a snarl. Dawn came across the hall fast and took his hand again, telling the Watcher, “Being personal pushes the wrong buttons right now. You should know that.”

“I do know that,” Giles said, not budging, continuing his sober inspection of Spike. “I know exactly what buttons it pushes. And I believe it’s important that he know that I do. Spike. You’re not alone in this. In…difficult circumstances, you’ve done very well.”

Spike burst out, “Fucking hell!” and twisted out from under the touch, pulled away from Dawn, heading for the front door. Couldn’t tolerate the Watcher’s pity…or his understanding. Sun was almost gone, he should manage all right. Get someplace fucking else, that was all. Stupid to have laired up so close, but he’d needed that--

Buffy was suddenly at the door, her back against it, blocking his way. Her eyes said she wasn’t about to move, neither.

Boxed between people he couldn’t hit, Spike flung himself up the stairs and out Buffy’s bedroom window onto the roof. Shrouded within clouds now, the sun offered an even light, directionless, everywhere the same. Some low level of burn to exposed skin but Spike processed that automatically, vaulting over the roof peak to descend and crouch at the edge like a gargoyle. He heard, felt, Buffy behind him, relentlessly pursuing. Couldn’t move. Couldn’t want to.

Coming down the low slant to stand beside him, she wordlessly offered a pack of cigarettes and a silver lighter. Bobbing his head in acknowledgement, he took them and shakily lit up.

“It all can be replaced,” she remarked, looking out over the darkening yard. Her scent flowed across him, surrounded him. “All of it except you. Lighters are easy. This--this is hard, though. Why is this so hard?”

“Dunno,” Spike muttered. “Just is. Let the bloody side down, didn’t I? Not nothing to be proud of. Not up to it. Not good for nothing, like this. Can see it but not do it. An’ before, do it all just fine, couldn’t see the way. Or the meaning. Ramifications. Consequences. In short, fucked. For the mongrel bastard freak I am. Can’t go neither forward nor back, can’t stand still. Doesn’t matter, though. Be gone soon, won’t matter.” Heat that felt like the sun’s burning roiled within him and he didn’t know how to shed it. Let it take him, then. Had it coming. Icarus.

Buffy settled down beside him, legs stretched out, feet dangling, and for a long time neither of them said anything. Spike pitched the butt-end and started another, just to have something for his hands to do.

“Never thought I’d ever do this,” Buffy remarked eventually. “Sit with you in the last of the light. Guess I should have known, though. You’re always surprising me. I no sooner say ‘never,’ and you’ve popped up and done it. I shouldn’t be so quick with the ‘never,’ I guess.”

When he chanced a glance, she wasn’t looking at him--both a disappointment and a relief.

After awhile, she commented, “I figured it out, you know. Why you started this. After the Hellmouth was shut, you waited for me to decide what way to go on. And I decided on the Slayer…and you. And the minute we got back, you started this: set the soul aside, began laying the infrastructure. Got Mike sorted, to be your right hand on your side of things. Began pulling away, so I wouldn’t get sucked into it and because you knew parts of it…wouldn’t be things I could accept. It was for me. To help me make Sunnydale a place a Slayer could live in, and be a Slayer with her vampire lover, and maybe not die quite so soon. Building it up from the vamp side of things, that I don’t really want to know about and I guess never will. Knowing better than I could what that would mean and require. It’s been for me.”

“’S always been for you, pet. Made a hash of it, though. ‘M sorry. Gonna be worse now than if I never started.” Spike pitched the second fag, though a good half of it was left. Had to pitch something, and himself off the roof wasn’t an option.

“No,” she responded thoughtfully, “you took it far enough that all the pieces are in place. It hasn’t fallen apart. And it won’t. We can take it from here, I think. Mike and I have been talking today, in our strange, un-talky way. And we’re both willing to try. Want to, actually. Because the dream you had is a good dream, and you brought it far enough that we both can see it. Most of it. Some of it.” She shrugged. “But it can’t work without you. You have to do the hand-off, then come in for the things nobody else can do. Nobody else is the one true heir of the Order of Aurelius. Nobody else commands Digger’s respect…and caution. Nobody else sees the whole of it, what it can be when it’s done and self-sustaining. Giles helped me see that part of it, because I’m blind as a bat when it comes to you. You know that. I look, and all I’m thinking is Yum, pretty, hot, I want that! Which isn’t too helpful for long-range strategy.” Another shrug and a wry smile.

She was so beautiful. Nothing like her ever before or ever again.

Impossible that she not be let down by his failure. But she was forever impossible. Forever surprising him. Forever dear and precious beyond measure.

He’d long since shifted back out of his demon aspect. Not comfortable to him anymore, most of the time, and soul got real indignant when he left his demon with the running of things. But curiously, neither soul nor demon was nagging at him at the moment. Both content and serene, not trying to grind him to powder between them.

Bronze, he thought, with a glimmer of what Red had been getting at. A true amalgam, not just the disparate pieces. Bronze. Maybe. Might be.

So right away, he came out with the worst of it: “Can’t keep on like I been doing. Goddam tribute blood, pig’s blood, s'all the same. Can’t tolerate it. For awhile I could tell myself I could make do like that, Angel does, an’ Angel ain’t got the option of a taste of you, every now and again. S'not enough. Got to hunt and take it live. That’s one thing that…whatever it was, with Rayne, taught me, made me know. It’s the life I’ve got to have. Starved, without. What I am. 'M not Angel, can’t do like he does. ‘F it's not live, has no meaning, and I need that. The meaning, as much as the blood. What I live on. Anything else, it’s just death in tiny sips. For me. Sorry. Can’t.”

“You now owe Dawn fifty cents,” said Buffy, and slid closer to gather him in against no resistance. He felt as though her scent and her warmth were soaking into him. She went on, “I know you’re not Angel. I’ve never wanted you to be. It’s not Angel I love--not anymore. Maybe Angel could have planned this all through, carried it out step by deliberate step, and made something like the Thousand Year Reich. But what would it be, what would I be, at the end of it? You’re not a cold-blooded planner. You’re a fighter. Like me. And you made the best start of it any fighter ever could. And brought it to the place we can take it on from here. It’s a good thing you were trying to do, and it will be a good thing when we’re done. Not 100%, but we live in Sunnydale, not heaven. And in Sunnydale, vamps are what they are. And I can’t wish them all gone. I just can’t. So I accept the forest, even though I’ll keep whacking at the individual trees whenever they deserve it. Or get in my way. Or have a real unlucky day. And we’ll do it together. If live blood is what you must have, then that’s what you get, however you have to. First you were forced, and afterward you tried, fair and square. For years. If you say it’s not enough, I’ll take your word for it. It’s not all one thing or all the other. You find out where the balance is. I told you, I love you all the way back and all the way forward, as far as we can go. I know I can’t have you feed on just me, can't be enough all by myself, though it feels great when we do it. If you don’t kill, and I know you don’t, anymore, I’m OK with it. Now the soul’s back, I have no problem letting you, and it, make that call. No explanation or apology needed, ever. You do what you do. I’m not your jailer or your judge. And not your executioner, ever. I only love you and think you’re the finest vamp that ever was or will be. And I don’t want you any different than you are. Scars and all.”

Her finger stroked the criss-cross scar on his brow, that was from a Slayer’s magicked blade, and she kissed his eyes, and maybe it wasn’t so hopeless as he'd believed, after all. So long as she still loved him.

**********

Spike was slouched in front next to Buffy, who was driving with her usual grim determination, as though the SUV had to be wrestled into submission at every turn and stop sign, most of the traffic signals having turned to blinking yellow or blinking red so late on a Saturday night. Buffy (Dawn thought) equated a blink with a flinch and gave such indecisive lights no quarter, barging through without touching the brakes at all.

Willow had the front passenger side, reviewing spells with a penlight, muttering under her breath. Glowering and cranky, Mike was with Dawn in the middle seat. They had to drop him up at the factory to choose the crew for the sweep, and he tried out a tentative roster on Spike, who only said, “Anybody you please.”

Mike leaned forward, objecting, “That’s no answer.”

“S’your call.”

Mike didn’t like that either, subsiding with a scowl.

“Keeping that Len as your second?” Spike inquired after a minute or so.

“Why shouldn’t I?” Mike shot back.

“No reason. Just wondered.”

“He’ll keep the fledges in line.”

“Oh. You’re gonna take fledges, then.”

“What of it? Gonna need ‘em, and they’re no loss.”

“Guess so.”

Buffy ran the yellow lights faster.

It was a relief to reach the factory’s driveway, where Mike got out and vanished into the dark as Buffy backed into the road to head back to the named mark.

Easing off on the gas now that stormcloud Mike had been ejected, Buffy asked Spike tightly, “How are you doing? If you say ‘fine,’ I’m gonna smack you.”

“All right, not fine then. That make you happier, pet?” Spike sounded tired and discouraged.

That was good, Dawn judged: it meant he wouldn’t start in about her anchor again for awhile. As Dawn leaned forward, arms folded along the seat back, Buffy demanded, “What’s got into Mike? What’s he so mad about? We agreed to help with the sweep.”

“Bit, you tell her.”

“Power vacuum noises?” Dawn hazarded.

“Something like.”

Buffy persisted, “What’s that mean when it’s in people-speak?” Although Buffy’s voice was sharp, Dawn saw that Buffy had her arm tucked through Spike’s, both her hands dutifully on the wheel. Spike was the only one-handed driver in the family. “Is he on board with this agreement or not?”

“His word’s good,” Spike replied. “He’ll do what he says, though maybe not the way anybody else would want him to. Dunno how he’ll jump. S’hard for him right now.”

“Does that mean you trust him?”

Sighing audibly, Spike slid lower, his knees against the dashboard.

He was unfocused, vague, drifty, uncertain--the most “off” Dawn had ever seen him, sober. Vulnerable. And Mike was affected by it: demanding orders Spike didn’t want to give and Mike resented taking.

“It’s like when Mom was sick,” Dawn formulated suddenly, “and you had to make my lunches. You had to do it because Mom couldn’t, but you hated doing it because that meant things weren’t right and you wanted Mom to get better so you could go back to being a kid again, and Slayer, of course, but she didn’t, and I was miserable because, well, Mom, and complaining about PB&J every day and being a brat because you weren’t Mom and you wouldn’t give me lunch money. And like that,” Dawn finished breathlessly. “Patterns all mixed up and conflicted. And in case I forgot to say, I’m sorry about being such a brat. And Mike absolutely hates not knowing where he stands. A fight would clear the air but, well, fight. Big mess.”

“Huh,” Buffy responded thoughtfully.

The mark was the theater again because it was a high traffic area every night and well lit by streetlights for several blocks in all directions. Buffy parked in front of Evans’ Florist, and Dawn knew what that meant: Buffy wanted to keep the SUV close as retreat or escape, and to protect it. Their Armored Personnel Carrier, fortress, and tank. As everybody got out, Dawn saw a couple figures on the opposite side of the street turn just a little too fast and vanish. Vamps. In a few minutes, the word would be out that no matter what anybody had expected, the sweep was on with the theater as the mark…and Spike was present and apparently presiding.

Giles had emphasized how crucial that was, and neither Spike nor Mike had argued although neither had seemed to like it. Spike had to be seen, and seem in control of things, as if nothing had changed. Otherwise, things would start coming apart real fast. Even though about the last thing Spike wanted tonight was to get into a fight, as off as he was. Dawn heard him mutter, accepting a hand axe from the stock in the back of the SUV, “Forgot to pay my dues in the scarecrow union.”

According to Giles, Rayne would want Spike left alone, hoping to reassert control and use him to manipulate the Chaos Stone. So it was reasonable that Digger would hold off on presenting a major challenge.

Spike had repeated, “Reasonable,” in a certain tone of voice, and Giles had admitted, “Yes, quite. Better double it, then.”

Because if anything was certain, it was that vamps didn’t go by what was reasonable--they saw weakness, vulnerability, and went after it in proper predator fashion.

Even his own. Even Mike, who showed up on his motorcycle a few minutes later, with the chosen crew piling out of three lame-looking vehicles like a bunch of circus clowns, only a lot less funny. Mike couldn’t give an order without half the crew looking to Spike for confirmation and the other half wandering ever-so-subtly into Spike’s personal space, bumping his shoulder or otherwise jostling him. By the time Xander arrived with the SITs, the whole vamp contingent was game-faced and edgy, not just the half-dozen fledges, who’d had to be sent to the back of the alley to keep them from coming at Dawn.

Spike had done that. Predictably and reassuringly. It was why Dawn was there, against Spike’s objections--to need protecting.

Officially, she was present to be a power source Willow could draw on if the mark came under attack. Unofficially, she was there to insure that Spike would actually fight if he had to, not just stand there and get dusted, as both she and Buffy were worried he’d do, left on his own.

After Mike had divided the crew into squads and given them their individual marks, he wandered over, still gloriously game-faced, and murmured, “Dawn Dragonslayer. Got your taser?”

“Right here,” Dawn said, showing him, and shook the bag of stakes slung over her shoulder by way of further demonstration that she was prepared to fight if the opposition didn’t do the sensible thing and came straight for Spike.

“Don’t you do that. If it turns into a scrap back here, you get inside the van, lock everything, and holler. Cell’s your best weapon here. Show me that.”

Dawn pulled the cellphone out of her overalls pocket, but Mike still wasn’t satisfied and made her call him to be sure both cells were charged and working. Then, his face smoothing, he just looked at her: not wanting her there any more than Spike did, but accepting that it wasn’t up to him. Stuck between what he wanted and what he could have, even in this.

It was so plain and so sweet that, having poked her cell away, Dawn caught up one of his hands in both hers, and it just sort of seemed natural that his arm turned her and curled around, enclosing her in a careful steady hug--their backs to Spike, she couldn’t help noticing.

“Don’t like this,” Mike’s voice rumbled in her ear. “Don’t like this at all.”

“I know. It will sort itself out. It’s the between that’s hard.”

A gulped chuckle. “Ain’t gonna say what I’m thinking. ‘Cause I’m a vamp, I expect.”

“Better let go,” Dawn advised, not pulling away, “or Buffy will have a fit.”

He didn’t stir either. “No, that’s fine now. She’s lifted her forbidding. Not up to nobody but you now.”

“What’d you hit her with?”

“Somewhat of a trade. Had something she wanted, so we worked it out.”

“The agreement,” Dawn realized, finally pulling away and turning to look him in the face, not sure if she liked being bartered like that.

Mike let her go, lifting a shoulder slightly. “Might have come into it anyway. But it was a good trade. Good reason.”

Better, he meant, than inadmissible worry about Spike, that would have been awkward for both vamps. Dawn shrugged in turn and scuffed a foot to show she understood the delicate balance of honor, power, and necessity Mike was trying to move through in a way that wouldn’t require settling dominance quite yet.

She told him, “We’re good,” and gave him a smile.

“That so,” he responded, smiling back--his eyes, mostly. “Have to explain to me what that means, sometime.”

“I haven’t figured that out yet myself. There are layers. And complications.”

Mike’s phone squawked, and he immediately put it to his ear, listened a moment, then said, “Yeah,” before stowing it in a front jeans pocket. “Got to go. Len’s got himself and the fledges into something.”

He waited for her nod, and looked for Spike’s acknowledgement, before swinging onto his bike and roaring off.

Dawn found Spike looking at her with no particular expression, but his only comment was, “Like he said--‘f this goes pear-shaped, you get in the van.”

There were just the three of them left. Buffy, the SITs, and Xander were one squad, sweeping an area four blocks on a side, centered on the mark, in constant touch with Willow, who’d set her spell book on a pile of empty cardboard boxes just inside the alley and was bent over, still studying it, the penlight poised in one hand and her cell held to her ear with the other.

Spike had picked a wall to lean against and smoke, looking bored and half asleep. Dawn didn’t see the axe and didn’t know what he’d done with it.

Wandering over, Dawn said, “I should have brought the headphones. Sorry--I didn’t think of it,” just to be saying something.

“Fine: only owe you twelve dollars and fifty cents,” Spike responded, naming the accrued total of the “sorry” penalties. “You hear anything lately from the Lady?”

“Nope. You?”

Spike shook his head, a frown between his half-shut eyes. “Wish I knew what the hell she wants to come out of this. If I’m even s’posed to still be here.”

“She put back your soul,” Dawn offered. “Kind of a waste, if you dusted right away.”

“Yeah. I guess.” Spike studied the coal of his cigarette. “I expect she just don’t want Rayne to have me. Past that, it’s all good.”

“Drama queen,” Dawn accused.

“That too. Got the kit for it….” Dawn thought he added, “And a lot of fucking bloody use….” Pitching the cigarette, he headed slope-shouldered down the alley to check something or maybe to avoid increasing his “sorry” debt.

The front of the theater had become busier, the last few minutes--one show was letting out, and people were lining up to buy tickets for the final show: on a Saturday, nearly always a creepfest of some sort. Big market for that in Sunnydale, Dawn had thought sourly more than once. Watch on the screen what they wouldn’t admit seeing on the street.

Naturally, that was ringing the dinner bell for vamps. All that inattentive food wandering out into the night, trying to recall where they’d parked, scattering into small groups, pairs, and singletons. That was the main reason the theater was a regular gathering-mark--to keep unauthorized vamps off the people leaving, especially those wearing the smell. And sure enough, Dawn spotted some vamps drifting in, casual and inconspicuous except for the glide of their walk and the calculating way they eyed the flow of the people around and past them.

Because they were coming through, straight for the alley. At least half a dozen: none game-faced, none in the colors. Using the crowd as cover to get close.

Backing deeper into the alley, taser extended, Dawn sang out, “Spike!”

***********

Spike was thinking about architecture. Towers, in particular. With gothic angles and swoops. Flying buttresses and the like. The sort rarely seen in California, where flat was much admired, or cheaper, or something or other. Tapered towers in Slovenia or whatever the hell it was now, with roofs like fish scales, nasty to climb but neat to look at, like the tower was a living thing. And then you had your medieval Norman towers with arrow-slit windows you could skinny through although it made the place fucking cold in the wintertime, never get warm no matter how you built the fires up after you’d eaten all the inhabitants and there was no other source of warmth handy though enough brandy helped some with that. Lacework Spanish towers, all symmetrical, builders expecting to get struck by lightning or something if one of the patterns actually made a picture though you couldn’t help looking for them (habit probably, or not being in the right mind-set for the Moorish influence), beautiful by moonlight.

He’d got into the habit of tower climbing whenever he was ejected from the current residence for Angelus to have both the women for himself, the bastard, and Spike left to cool his heels, useless, frustrated, and furious. So he had quite a collection of towers in his mind to review, since the mood was on him again, though he didn’t have Angelus to blame for it, not even for the fact of being a fucking vampire, since that was Dru’s whim and none of Angelus’ doing.

Nothing worth the name in Sunnydale, not even a church steeple (lots of Mission-style flat) except for Glory’s rickety, jerry-built model that he didn’t like to think about even yet.

Probably for the best, since if he’d had one and tried to climb it, he probably would have fucked that up too. Useless git.

Pacing the alley, he felt Rayne at the edges of his mind but that didn’t signify, he wasn’t interested in that at all now, not even his demon, that was embarrassed to have been so easily sucked in for something that was only in the head, fake, nothing real. Sullen and silent within him, temporarily tamed by the lash of his contempt. Fucking bitch, roll over and beg for more, give it up to the first smooth-talker that asked, bloody stupid ugly worthless cunt of a demon.

When Dawn yelled, Spike barely took any notice. Witch would take care of that though vamps were coming from the back of the alley too, both directions. He felt it pass through him like the shock of hitting a disinvite--a bubble of force that closed off the alley and the three of them inside it. Opposition couldn’t get through. Nothing he needed to do about it, just as he’d expected. He pitched one cigarette and lit another, recollecting a tower in Prague.

A lance of force pierced the bubble and it collapsed. Grabbing Dawn’s hand and the both of them retreating toward him, the witch remade the invisible wall but it felt shaky now, flowing and changing like a soap bubble. Spike began to be concerned. Then Dawn went down all in a heap and the witch swung around, pale and wide-eyed, and it was a fight after all.

It’d been stupid to toss the axe onto the boxes, being so certain he’d have nothing to do. Should have expected that would be wrong. He went past the Witch and over Dawn in a rolling forward dive, catching up the long band of the bag of stakes, and plowed into the front wave of vamps swinging the bag to back them off: wood hurt, no matter what part of a vamp’s anatomy it hit. Less effective in the sack, though. As quick as he could, he grabbed a pair out and was in business, Willow meanwhile dragging Dawn against the nearer wall to put it at her back and casting baseball-sized clumps of glowy stuff at the vamps coming in from behind. Not much power in those, though: the vamps startled and held for a second when they were hit, then came on, not hurt at all that Spike could tell.

He’d taken out three vamps, and that left about ten remaining, and he was only engaged with four of them. The fight wasn’t balancing and he couldn’t cast the choreography, the flow of it, out in his mind. Didn’t matter, he supposed: Buffy and the SITs would be along soon to sort it. Only have to hold awhile, long enough for them to arrive, and afterward didn’t matter.

But the vamps he was engaged with should have swarmed him by now, two were big sods he recalled seeing sometime at Willy’s, but they were treating him like an incidental nuisance, belting him into walls and such but not locking him down for the kill. More intent on getting past him, he thought while hooking a leg out from under one of the smaller pair and stomping the knee before spinning out of what’d been meant as a headlock, with no time to place the stake. When the witch yelled in fury, behind him, he understood: they weren’t after him. They were after Dawn.

It felt like waking up, all over. His demon roused at the insult and even the soul was incensed, aflame with the need to defend, protect. Everything slowed down slightly because he was seeing it all, the true target at the center and therefore all the other motions comprehensible, even predictable.

Being flung into the wall for maybe the fifth time slowed him down a little but he had it mapped now, how to weave the blows, one, two, three, and duck and ease back, spin, take out the last one and be clear to confront the bunch behind.

It wasn’t gonna wait for Buffy, he already knew that, and if the witch couldn’t keep them off, there were enough to keep him engaged while Bit was hurt or taken or whatever they meant to do to her. Go to the fallback, then.

He’d used the alley of the theater as the mark often enough that he knew every inch and had a whole variety of contingency plans formulated and stored. Most didn’t cover this situation, with Bit down and the witch not able to jump the twenty feet to the bottom of the fire escape. So he went with another option, using the relative freedom of not being specifically targeted to get past and haul open the metal fire door, illegally locked to prevent anybody from sneaking in and seeing their crappy movies for free, setting off alarms inside, and that was fine with Spike: the more noise and confusion, the better. He yanked harder and took the whole door off its hinges and slammed it edgewise into as many vamps as he could reach, then flung it flat into the rest. That bought enough time for the witch to drag Dawn inside as the first panicked patrons came the other way, tangling with the vamps just getting themselves sorted again.

Spike shoved and elbowed himself inside with the half-formed intention of yelling “Fire!” to stir things up even more. Instead, some weird freak of habit made him lift an arm and yell, “Here!” as he backed Willow into the angle between the side of the stage and the rear wall and took a stance to guard the corner.

One, and then two, and then another pair, and then five, weren’t running. Hearing, they came to him, the untried ignorant children, veterans of the class, helping keep that corner protected from the storm surge of bodies trying to get out the door all at once. He saw Candy’s erect topknot and the two improving trippers and a couple of other known faces, and when he directed, “Lock arms. Stand,” they did that, swaying as they needed to, to make and hold contact with one another until the crowd thinned, most having headed for the front when the alarms started going off.

With the counter-flow easing, the vamps came in. So did Buffy and the SITs. The children had no business mixing into that, so Spike told the nearest one, “Stand. Stay put,” and dove into the melee.

The SITs had their tasers and it seemed to be settling nicely, with all but two down and then dusted, the SITs fighting efficiently by threes, two engaging and the lead going for the kill, when a new bunch barged in and they were fighting all over the clear area between the first seats and the stage, and some of the children were getting hurt and tossed around, unable to hold. But the tasers were still the margin: get in a charge clean, and the vamp was down, could be tended to later. SITs, they could mind themselves: Spike turned to get the children out of it. Some injuries as he pried them away from attacking vamps and shoved them clear, but that was better than getting their throats torn out. Stupid fucking movie still playing, everything flickering from the change of scenes and angles, screaming on the speakers as some idiot teens or other ran from some lame monster doing about an inch a year and still being overtaken, watch out for the root, oops, same every time, and until he caught the terror in the children’s faces, he hadn’t bothered to think he’d gone game-faced, of course he had, needed the velocity and the sight and the ferocious single-mindedness of his demon, didn’t he, and not about to shed it to avoid frightening teenagers who’d otherwise be so much dead meat.

It was Mike who had the good manners and consideration. Spike stuck to what he knew: direct, bloody mayhem.

And when they had that nearly all sorted, and Buffy coming toward him in the headache-inducing flicker, with the worst possible timing in the world, more reinforcements arrived: that Len and the fledges, who knew enough to veer around Buffy and the SITs but came straight at the children, many of which were deliciously bleeding.

Spike foresaw the awfulness, shaped in his mind as clear as if it’d already happened, and put himself inevitably between, calling, “Stand. Whoever budges is gone.”

But they were only fledges, and their demons hadn’t yet learned to mind them, let alone anybody else. They came on--swift, unheeding, and ravenous. He took the first two and pitched them into the rest, they were dust already by his word except for Mike’s thrift, and he’d carry out the execution himself if he had to. They checked and looked at him, assessing and smelling, and he knew they were thinking of taking him down. He’d taken damage, no hiding it; and the urge to challenge and pull down a wounded leader was instinctual. He’d watched Mike fighting it for hours. He’d done it himself a few times.

Likely he could take them all. That was one way things could go. If Buffy and the SITs couldn’t keep out of it, any tentative alliance she’d made with Mike was done, right there. That was another way things could go.

Spike twisted and broke the bangle. Using the jagged edge, he opened his right arm from elbow to thumb--offering the fledges a third alternative.

They weren’t of his bloodline. But blood as old as his had its own draw for any fledge--for its rarity, if nothing else. And they were his. He’d said so. They had more claim on his protection than the children.

He opened the other arm and stood waiting.

The first one to come was Sue--latching on high, above the cut, and biting deep. Leaving room for two others, farther down. The next was a stupid little fledge, called himself Teddy, really dumb name for a vamp, have to think of something better sometime. After Teddy, a vamp turned later than most, all starved bone and stretched flesh, smell of dirt, smell of paper, books, dirty clothes, floppy ill-trimmed grey hair, and this must be the new Dalton, the former Cyrus Smith, and Mike had no business letting him out so soon where he might get hurt, Spike would have to have words with Mike about that. Vamp Cyrus made wet, humming noises as he fed.

Couldn’t kill a vamp by draining. Might be awhile feeding up again and might well get dusted while he was weak and unable to defend himself properly, but draining alone wouldn’t do it. So once the fledges were all latched on and occupied, Spike didn’t worry about the situation anymore, let the fog roll in however it pleased because what he was doing goddam meant something, it was a goddam transaction, and nobody would get dead from it, so that was all right and enough. Didn’t hurt a bit.

And Buffy, bless her, knew enough not to interrupt.

When the dizziness got strong enough that he couldn’t hold stance and went down, he figured somebody would come at his throat, to do the thing properly. But nobody did, which was odd. Muzzy headed, he found the fledges all backed off and being chewed out by Len and Mike, except for Sue, kneeling maybe a foot away. When their eyes met, Sue said, “I’m yours. To come and go from your hand and by your word. I remember how that was now.”

After awhile he thought of what to say in reply: “You’re mine, Suzanne. You come and go from my hand. I’ll keep you from true death, the best I can.”

Then Cyrus, all bloody-faced and goggling, apparently with a thing for ceremony, came and said the same thing as Sue had, more or less, since he said it in Bensht, a defunct demon tongue, and Spike had to think how to answer him the same, since Bensht was full of glottal stops and awkward to pronounce.

When Spike had made the reply, Cyrus added, “Eternities of language. Thank you for choosing me.” His face practically glowed. Or maybe it was the yellow eyes.

“Yeah, we’ll talk about how great it was you were turned some other time. Now fuck off.”

“Of course, Master Spike.” Cyrus backed off, still on his knees, making way for the next one. Two was precedent: now they all wanted to do it. Fucking fledges, bending to any wind that blew. Now Mike was going at it with Len, who probably wouldn’t be second anymore, assuming Mike didn’t just wring his head off. Mike seemed really pissed off.

Nothing to do with Spike. He didn’t have to worry about that anymore.

Spike didn’t pay much attention, mechanically acknowledging the declarations, until he realized the person in front of him was Amanda. As usual on sweep or patrol, she was in the colors. But it wasn’t usual that the neckband of the tee had been raggedly cut and pulled apart, hanging in a flap in front, baring her neck and part of her shoulder.

Spike said, “You don’t have to do this.”

Amanda glanced favorlessly at the fledges, now all backed off and meek as milk. “They’re outgo. We’re income. We have a bargain, Spike.”

He couldn’t recall if he’d promised or not, so he said, “Hell with the bargain.”

“Doesn’t work like that,” said Rona, coming and hunkering down. Kennedy stood behind her, looking peeved, which didn’t mean much because she mostly looked that way. Both SITs had torn, dangling neckbands too. Spike shut his eyes and tried not to hear their heartbeats. Rona went on, “We’ve been through this all the ways from Sunday, Spike. You said we were in, and this is part of being in. Don’t be an asshole about it, OK?”

“It would mark you,” Spike objected.

“Funny thing,” said Rona, “we all forgot to bring our little tin cups. Have to do it the old-fashioned way.”

And Kennedy said, “Spike, don’t you think we’re marked already?”

Spike couldn’t think of any good answer to that, so he said, “Ain’t given you the weapons practice you wanted.”

“That’s lame,” Amanda commented to Kennedy. “That’s the lamest thing yet. Will you quit trying to find excuses and get on with it? I have a chemistry test on Monday that I haven’t studied for.”

“Buffy?” Spike looked around for her, found her watching with her arms folded.

“We’ve had this discussion,” she commented flatly. “It’s live, it’s willing, and I’m not getting you off the hook here. Do, or do not: your call, Master Yoda. Besides, I’m dessert.” She grinned at him smugly.

Spike leaned in fast, figuring Amanda would flinch and that would be the end of it. But she didn’t. Then he waited for the soul to kick in, give him hell about it. He was vaguely surprised when that didn’t happen either. Apparently donation wasn’t quite as disgusting as feeding that was forced, involuntary, coerced. Done the soul good, maybe, sticking it out in the noplace for awhile: made it a fraction less absolute and unreasonable.

Very slowly Spike let himself lean the final inch, tasting the place a moment, breathing in the sweet skinscent of healthy young girl. This girl: Amanda. Herself and no other. No more than the barest touch needed to break the skin. Then the fast, hot, blood leaping to him, in him completely like an electrical charge or getting drenched in a storm, no part more than another. He was, literally, alive with it. But even more, with the meaning of it. He’d likely said it wrong or maybe hadn’t understood it well himself. But it was the meaning--the care, the gift--that came into him, that sufficed.

When he gently pressed and licked the bite shut, Amanda protested anxiously, “You barely took any. There’s more!”

“You’re now officially a cow, Amanda,” said Rona, shuffling closer on her knees. “Kindly shut up and move away from the loading area. Next tanker’s here.”

“Wasn’t I good? Did I do something wrong?” Amanda bleated.

Out of the center of a great peace and exasperated affection, Spike told her, “You’re perfect, love. Any more perfect, you’d be in heaven for a saint and Buffy’d have her nose out of joint for…well, forever. ‘Tisn’t like bangers and mash here, by the pound, so much to the quid. S’magic, pet.” He wondered if he’d ever truly realized that himself, or if he’d once known and somehow forgotten. Didn’t stink like magic, maybe because nobody had made it. It just was.

Eyes falling shut, he leaned to Rona and tasted the contour of her neck with the bloodbeat underneath and her good smell that was hers alone, nothing else ever like her, and then the deeper taste, and the vibration as her voice gasped, “Oh, lordy!” But she wasn’t afraid, he could taste that, taste it all, the whole of her. Demon considered it would have been better if she was terrified and subdued to it, soul considered it quite fine just as it was. Spike let them have it out between them, wholly in the moment and in no hurry whatever to be done.

When he had it all, all the meaning, he nuzzled at her breasts, then pushed lower. Ah. Taint of cancer in the blood, very faint. Not her breasts: down below, in her woman-parts. He’d tell her later. There’d be time. Or maybe not. Couldn’t depend on time.

Straightening, he touched her chin, made her look at him, all game-faced as he was. “Rona, first thing tomorrow, you get up to the clinic. Buffy, she’ll tell you who to ask for. Nothing real wrong yet, and ‘f you see to it now, there won’t be. Will you do that?”

Now she was scared. Not with a vampire at her throat. Seldom in a fight. Only now. “You’d just nag me to death if I don’t, right?”

“Certain sure. Some things, you just don’t fuck about with, figure if you don’t admit you notice, they’ll bugger off all on their own, like a proposition from an ugly guy. This ugly guy stays till you chuck him out, good and proper.”

“Yeah, Spike. All right. Ken, you’ll come with me, right?”

“I’m the backup, in case the doc gets personal and needs punching out,” Kennedy drawled, theorizing. “I’m always up for a good fight. Have to check my busy social calendar, but I think the morning’s open. Come on, Spike. Things to break, people to do.”

As Rona pushed to her feet, Kennedy knelt down and Spike leaned to her. She was rigid, vibrating, terrified, angry. Anywhere close, he’d have known it. He stopped, sighed.

In a choked, almost soundless whisper, she said, “You are not gonna not do this. Doesn’t matter if you hate it, or I hate it. Not gonna not do it.”

Because the meaning of his excluding her would be wrong. He understood that completely and bit down. Her blood was full of rage and dread. Extremely charged, flavorful. Determination didn’t have a taste, but he knew it was there, past the reach of his senses.

Didn’t take much to have it all. He licked shut the wound he’d made.

Looking him steadfastly in the eyes, Kennedy challenged, “You sending me anyplace? Got a specialist in mind?”

He let game face fade, having no present need of it. “No. S’all right, inside, best I can tell.”

“It is?” She sounded surprised.

“The rest, that’s nobody’s business but yours. An’ knew it anyway, pretty much.”

Easing back from Kennedy, he flipped to his feet and looked around, a little surprised they hadn’t been interrupted, what with the alarms still going on and all. But maybe proprietors in Sunnydale had a sensible reluctance to investigate large fucking melees in the middle of the night. Most likely they’d scarpered, like the rest.

As he’d expected, Buffy was only a few steps off, trying not to glower and looking stiff, sour, and pissed off in consequence. Never would be easy with his feeding off anybody but her, regardless of what anybody paid lip service to. He had the feeling he was gonna hear about this later, from some different direction than where it really was coming from.

“Dessert?” Buffy asked, trying to fake enthusiasm.

“Not just now, love. Bit? You with us?”

“Yeah, Spike. Newest member of ‘I hate it when somebody fucks with my head’ club present and accounted for.” She was leaning on the edge of the stage. Looked a little wobbly and she’d sicked up on the floor, standing on tip-toe well clear of the puddle. Good thing, he decided, to get her away from it.

“Fetch the kit from the van. ‘Manda--”

Still in surly game face, Mike showed Amanda some teeth, warning her off as escort, claiming that position for himself, and the two of them went off.

Spike considered the children. One of the trippers, George, was down and dead, nothing to be done about it. Broken neck, by the look of it. The other one, Andy, was on his feet and had armed himself with a stake from the bag Spike must have dropped sometime in the festivities. The rest were huddled behind, against the front of the stage. Considerable bloodsmell in that quarter, he’d known that before: what had drawn the fledges, that Mike seemed to have sent off, likely to finish their sweep. No present problem from that direction anyway.

Terror sweat coming off them like fog. But they were balanced on a point, waiting. Or maybe just frozen in shock, too many things they really didn’t want to know, all at once and still there, not to be denied or rationalized away.

Spike first thought one way, that it would be best to hang back and let Buffy and the SITs tend to them, judge if any needed to go to hospital, they had a lot of practice with that. Then he thought another way, and strolled toward them, then turned to shove one of the seats open and drop into it, a wide sprawl: not so close they’d take it as threat, not knowing yet how fast he could move when he wanted to. Well within striking distance, every one of them.

“Decent,” he told Andy, “for a first engagement. Wasn’t set up well, though: we took losses. Too many hurt that needn’t have been. But you stood your ground, and--”

“What are you?” Andy demanded, face twisting. “No kind of an angel!”

So Candy, she’d been blabbing. No real surprise there.

“Not hardly. Same as I’ve been all along. The class, and now. Figured to show some of you that side of things…but not yet. And not like this.” As Mike and Dawn came back, Mike toting the big metal first-aid case so that Dawn was absurdly escorting him, Spike went on, “It’s done now, for the moment. Nobody here means you any harm whatever. Get you patched up and sorted, see who needs more tending, who’s mostly all right and fit to go. Then those that want to, we can have that talk.”

Mike opened the case on a nearby seat, and the three SITs gathered in to talk to the children and assay the damage. Dawn plunked down on the seat to Spike's left to keep him company and try to bruise his fingers with the strength of her grip.

“Not your usual disorganized vamp fight,” she commented, looking straight ahead and talking to the air. “He was ready for us. Each of us and all of us. Didn’t know or forgot about the phones, though. I think. Or we’d have been in deep trouble.”

“Yeah,” Spike agreed absently, pushing out of the chair as Amanda called him to help replace a dislocated shoulder. Buffy could have done it, just as well. But he’d made up his mind: these children were not to be allowed to be afraid of him. So he took care of it himself, afterward moving among them as he was called or needed.

Fed up so fine, he found the blood no distraction, no temptation.

Next Part

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