Joyce set coffee cups down in front of Buffy and Spike, returned to the kitchen, and came back carrying a cup for herself. She sat down, gave Spike a hard stare, and then her eyebrows lifted. “Are those acid burns?” she asked.
“Something like that,” Spike agreed.
“Shouldn’t you get them seen by a doctor?” She turned her gaze to Buffy. “And shouldn’t we call the police? I don’t care if he is your former boyfriend, if that Angel person is throwing acid on people he should be in jail. This young man could have been blinded!”
“Wasn’t Angel,” Spike told her. “Drusilla. My ex. She’s the one who did this to me. Angel only tried to kick in my ribs.”
“Oh? And that’s not criminal? He’s threatened me, he’s made threats against you, and he’s beaten up one of your friends. Buffy, if you won’t call the police, then I will.”
“No!” Buffy protested. “Mom, no police, please?”
“And why not?”
Buffy hesitated. She didn’t want to tell her mother about vampires, and Slayers, and everything that went with them, but she was beginning to think that it couldn’t be avoided.
Spike stepped in to help her out. “Cops are as likely to take his word as mine. Rather keep the police out of it, if you don’t mind, Mrs. Summers.”
Joyce stared at him again. “I take it you’ve been in trouble yourself?” Her forehead wrinkled as he nodded. “Have we met?”
“Uh, yeah,” Spike admitted. “You hit me with an axe once. Remember? ‘Get the hell away from my daughter’. Sorry about all that.”
Buffy winced. “Spike’s not like that any more, Mom.”
“Spike? I thought you said his name was William.” She fixed him with a piercing gaze. “Are you dating my daughter?”
“Not dating, no,” Spike said, shaking his head. “We do a few things together, but not dating.”
Buffy saw the look on her mother’s face at Spike’s choice of words and hastened to clarify the issue. “We practice martial arts together, Mom, that’s all. No kissing, a world of no to anything more than kissing. We’re friends, that’s all.”
“Hmm.” Joyce gave both of them a hard stare. “Whatever happened to those nice friends you used to have? Willow Rosenberg, and that Xander boy?”
“They’re still my best friends,” Buffy told her. “Uh, they’re friends of Spike too.” She wondered if she was stretching the truth there, but she was pretty sure that Willow would class herself as Spike’s friend – his saving of Jenny had won Willow’s affection right at the start of his change of allegiance – and Xander had been pretty much all on board with the Spike-saving earlier in the day.
“Oh.” Joyce’s expression softened. “Well. That puts a different complexion on things. I’ve certainly no objection to you learning martial arts, as long as you only use them in self-defense, and, well, if you have to have an older boyfriend who used to be in a gang, at least this one seems to be better than the last.”
“I told you, Mom, Spike’s not my boyfriend!” Buffy protested.
“If you say so, dear,” Joyce said. A quirk of her eyebrow showed that she didn’t believe her daughter. “More coffee, anyone?”
“So Mom said, ‘If you say so, dear’,” Buffy related to Willow, “and she did this thing with her eyebrow, and it was like she was thinking ‘Why not?’ and hey, Spike totally charmed her. I mean, the last time they met she hit him with an axe, but he was all nice and everything, and by the time we left I was thinking she was going to start asking him why he wasn’t dating me, and I would have totally died.”
“Uh, if she doesn’t know about Angel and the soul thing, I can totally understand it,” Willow said. “She never met Angel, only Angelus, and hey, even when he was bad Spike was nicer than Angelus. And,” Willow paused and lowered her eyes, and a tinge of color appeared on her cheeks, “Spike is kinda hot. More than Angel, at least I think so, ‘cause hey, Angel’s just too tall and kinda loomy, and Spike’s more the right size. Uh, not that I’m saying Angel’s not hot, well, when he has a soul and isn’t killing my little fishies that is, and, I think I’ll just shut up and go and help Miss Calendar get set up for the spell.”
Spike overheard most of the conversation and a little smile came to his lips. Willow moved away from Buffy and he turned his attention to Giles.
“Are you sure that you are, ah, well enough for a fight, should it come to it, Spike?”
“Yeah, don’t worry about it,” Spike assured the Watcher. “Angelus was going for pain, not damage. S’ppose he must still have been thinking about me swapping places the other way, not wanted to damage the merchandise when it might end up being his, y’know.”
“Quite probably,” Giles agreed. He adjusted the position of his glasses and cleared his throat. “Do you, ah, believe that his hypothesis is correct?”
Spike shrugged. “Don’t care. Not going back on the deal, regardless. I like it on this side of the fence. Always wanted to be somebody special, y’know? Most of the things I did as the Big Bad were ‘cos I wanted to get a rep, impress Dru and Angelus and even Darla, not that she ever took that much notice. Being a Champion makes me special, long as I live up to it, and, tell you what, it’s a sodding fantastic feeling knowing that there’s people who’ll come for me if I’m in the shit. Never had that before, not even really from Dru.”
The open admission of his motivations began to make Spike feel ill at ease, and he toyed with the hilt of the sword. “Speaking of whom, if it comes down to a tight situation, don’t hold back from dusting her. Not as dead set on keeping her alive as I was.”
Giles’ eyes widened. “Because of the torture?”
“Not just that. ‘Cos of why she was doing it. To get me to do what another bloke wanted. I don’t come first with her, realize that now, and maybe she doesn’t come first with me any more. Not that I want her dead, been through a lot together, and maybe we can work things out when she gets a soul, but if she gets dusted, well, ‘s not the end of the world. Rather her than one of you lot, so, don’t take chances with her ‘cos of me.”
“We’ll bear that in mind,” Giles said. “Hopefully it won’t come to that. The ideal would be for us to complete the ritual with no interruptions.”
“They know, mate. They’ll be here to try to stop you, count on it.” Spike looked around the library. “We’ve probably got them outnumbered, Angelus can’t have that many minions left after Buffy and Kendra killed a couple more today, should be able to hold our own. Still, might have been a better idea to do the spell in a house, where they couldn’t get in at all.”
“They wouldn’t have to get in to disrupt things,” Giles pointed out. “They could use petrol bombs, for instance. Here the school buildings are less vulnerable to such things and, as they can get in, they’re unlikely to resort to less personal measures.”
“Good point, yeah, and if they do burn the place to the ground, well, it’s town property not yours, right?”
“Indeed,” Giles agreed, although in fact that particular aspect of the choice of venue hadn’t occurred to him. He turned to Jenny. “Are we ready?”
“Almost,” Jenny answered.
“I don’t get this bit,” Willow remarked. “It’s not part of the spell, and neither is the fasting thing.”
“All magic has consequences,” Jenny said, her tone the one she used when lecturing her pupils. “We are dealing with the Rituals of the Undead here, and that’s what you would call major league mojo. It’s not just a question of successfully completing the spell, and achieving the desired results, but of ensuring that there are no adverse effects upon the caster. It would work without the purification ritual and the fasting, but there would be a chance that darkness would gain a foothold upon the caster’s soul, and that’s not a risk I’m prepared to take. Never take magic lightly, Willow.”
“I won’t,” Willow promised, her expression serious.
“I know you won’t,” Jenny smiled fondly. “Now, take this incense and circle the table three times widdershins. You too, Cordelia. Counter-clockwise.”
“Take care to get the right vampires, luv,” Spike reminded her. “No soul for me.”
“I’ll be careful, Spike,” Jenny promised. “Now, no more talking to us from here on. We mustn’t be interrupted.”
“Right, got you.” Spike moved away from the table where the ritual was being performed and began to pace the room. Buffy and Kendra stood on guard. Giles, Xander, and Oz sat down and cocked their crossbows.
The preparatory work for the ritual had been completed, and Jenny was just beginning to speak the words of the spell itself, when the vampires attacked.
The library doors burst open and Angelus, Drusilla, and a tall bald-headed henchman strode in. Simultaneously two other vampires dropped down from the ventilation ducts. One attacked Kendra, who was only feet from its landing point, and the other poised itself to jump at the table where Jenny sat.
Kendra clotheslined her attacker, bent to plunge a stake into its chest, and then drew out Mister Pointy and faced Angelus. The other infiltrator was targeted by a volley of crossbow bolts and disintegrated.
The confident, mocking, smile on Angelus’ face wavered. Drusilla hissed in fury and raised her hands like claws. The bald henchman hesitated. Spike advanced towards him with his sword poised for a slashing cut to the head, but Buffy leaped ahead of him and thrust her stake home.
“Gods, bind them,” Jenny chanted. “Cast their hearts from the evil realm…”
“No!” Angelus gasped. “It can’t end like this! It’s not fair!”
“I implore you, Lord, do not ignore this request,” Jenny continued inexorably.
“Look into my eyes, little one,” Drusilla murmured, waving her hands hypnotically from side to side, but a tinge of desperation had crept into her voice.
“No way, José, I know that trick,” Buffy said, keeping her eyes fixed on Drusilla’s torso.
“Won’t work, Dru,” Spike shook his head. “Do yourself a favor, luv, just give up.”
“Neither dead, nor of the living…”
“Be in me,” Drusilla implored. Kendra’s eyes started to follow the motion of Drusilla’s hands. Her eyes glazed briefly, and her stake sagged to point at the floor, but Cordelia grabbed her shoulder and shook her. The Slayer returned to her senses and she raised Mister Pointy again. Her lips set in a tight line and she fixed her angry stare at Angelus.
“Let these Orbs be the vessels that shall carry their souls to them…”
Angelus stared at the Orbs of Thesulah on the library table. He tensed for a spring. Spike moved his sword to bar the way and shook his head.
Angelus smiled disarmingly and relaxed. “I guess I’ll just have to get used to the soul all over…” he began, and then suddenly sprang to one side and tried to dodge past Spike. Kendra swept his legs out from under him and Angelus crashed to the floor face first.
“So shall it be!” Jenny commanded.
Drusilla shrieked and dived forwards, hands outstretched, and ran straight into a punch and elbow-strike combination from Buffy that halted the vampiress dead in her tracks and doubled her over.
Angelus put his hands to the floor and began to get to his feet. Kendra stamped on his back and knocked him flat again.
“So shall it be!” Jenny cried again. She gestured from the Orbs to the vampires. “Now!”
There was a brief flash of light from the Orbs. Drusilla raised her head and Buffy saw a red glow spark within her eyes for a brief instant. The glow faded and Drusilla’s eyes grew wide. “No!” she cried. “What have I done? I’m a wicked girl. God has rejected me.”
“What’s going on?” Angel said from the floor. “Buffy?”
“Angel?” Buffy asked softly. “Angel, is that you?”
Kendra took her foot away from Angel’s back and allowed him to rise. Buffy walked slowly towards Angel, her face glowing. Spike lowered his sword and walked equally slowly towards Drusilla.
“Deus meus, ex toto corde poenitet, me omnium meorum peccatorum, eaque detestor,” Drusilla recited in a sing-song tone. “Quia peccando, non solum poenas a te iuste, statutas promeritus sum, sed praesertim qui offendi te, summum bonum, ac dignum qui super omnia diligaris. Ideo firmiter propono, adiuvante gratia tua, de cetero me non peccaturum peccandique occasiones, proximas fugiturum. Amen.”
“Dru?” Spike said softly. He laid down the sword and held out his hand to her.
“Buffy?” Angel said. “What are we doing in the library? I don’t remember. We were … we were just…”
“Angel, you’re back,” Buffy beamed.
“William? Have you also received your soul?” Drusilla asked.
“No, luv, that was special for you and Angel,” Spike said. “You okay, pet?”
Drusilla recoiled from him. “Soulless creature, cast out by God, get away from me! I am damned, evil in his sight, and must seek repentance.”
Spike turned away from Drusilla, deeply hurt by the horror and loathing in her eyes, and found himself facing a hostile stare from Angel.
“Spike? What’s he doing here, Buffy? Why aren’t you staking him?”
“Spike has been filling your role as Champion during your period of, ah, soullessness,” Giles said in a reproving tone, “and, I might say, filling the role admirably.”
“But he’s evil!” Angel protested.
“Oh, come off it, you lying git,” Spike retorted. “You didn’t lose your memory the last time you got stuck with a soul. You needn’t think you’re gonna get a free pass for the last few months by faking that it’s all a blank to you.”
Angel averted his eyes and met Buffy’s stare. Her eyes were wide and questioning, her lip trembling slightly, and Angel quickly turned away from her gaze. “I – I tortured you,” he admitted to Spike. “I killed people.”
“You killed my little fishies,” Willow reminded him. Her eyes were cold and unfriendly.
“I’m sorry,” Angel said. “Forgive me. I wasn’t in my right mind.”
“Yeah, I guess,” Willow replied, and fell silent without saying anything about forgiveness.
“Drusilla,” Giles said, approaching her cautiously. “Do you know me?”
“Of course I do, Mister Giles,” Drusilla said. “You are the Watcher.” Her eyes were clear and her tone calm and lucid. “Are you going to take care of me?”
“Ah, well, I had thought that Spike, William that is, would be the best fitted to help you adapt,” Giles told her.
“He has no soul!” Drusilla wailed, her eyes wild. “He is damned. As am I, for I have sinned, I have sinned mortally. My soul burns me! Make it go. Make it go away, make it go away!”
Spike gave her a hard stare. “That last bit would have been a lot more effective if you hadn’t slipped into the tune of the song you were quoting, luv. Faking it a bit, aren’t you?”
“Hey!” Angel protested. “You know nothing about how it feels, Spike.”
“Don’t need to have a soul to tell when she’s bloody quoting Kate Bush,” Spike retorted.
“Coincidence,” Angel stated flatly. “She’s in torment, can’t you see?”
“You’ll help me, won’t you, Angel?” Drusilla pleaded. “You’ll stay with me? I’m lost and all alone.”
“Of course I will,” Angel promised.
“Angel?” Buffy quavered. “What about us?”
“I have to think of Drusilla before I can think about us,” Angel said. “I have a responsibility to her. I destroyed her, destroyed her whole family, broke her mind. She’s my greatest crime. I have to try to put that right.”
Spike stared at Drusilla suspiciously and was sure that he saw a triumphant smile flicker across her lips for an instant.
“Uh, I guess that we’re all finished here,” Xander spoke up, “so I’m voting that we get out now. If Principal Snyder drops by, well, I’m not going to be the one who explains what we’re doing.”
“Extra study before finals,” Jenny Calendar said calmly. “You could certainly do with it, Xander.”
“Well, yeah, but Willow doesn’t need it. Although, yeah, if there’s any extra study going she’d go for it, but hey, we should leave anyway.”
“I’m guessing the world is pretty safe now, so, party?” suggested Cordelia.
“Right, let’s hit the Bronze.” Xander linked arms with his girlfriend. “Coming, Will? Oz? Buff?”
Buffy stood rigid, staring at Angel.
“I’ll see you tomorrow, Buffy,” Angel said. “I have to look after Drusilla first. I have to see that she’s all right. You understand that, Buffy, don’t you?”
Buffy shook her head. “No, Angel, I don’t understand. We’re in love. You killed Darla for me, remember?”
“Darla didn’t have a soul, Buffy,” Angel said. His tone sounded slightly patronizing, at least to Spike, as if he was explaining something to someone who was too obtuse to see the obvious.
“Oh, bugger off with Dru then, you git,” Spike snapped. “Only not in my car. Keys?”
Angel’s brow lowered. “You can’t make Drusilla walk all the way back to the mansion in her condition.”
“She’s not sodding pregnant,” Spike retorted. “You’ve been back and forwards from there before you nicked my car. You don’t need it. Give it back.”
“Okay,” Angel agreed reluctantly. He fished the keys to the DeSoto from his pocket and tossed them to Spike. “We have to talk, Spike.”
“Yeah, we do.” Spike fielded the keys and pocketed them. “Okay, who wants a lift?”
“It’s a nice night,” Angel said coldly. “I think we’ll walk.”
“Spike? Uh, guys, I don’t feel like Bronzing it tonight, ‘kay?” Buffy turned big sad eyes from Xander’s group back to Spike. “Spike, would you give me a ride home?”
“Sure thing, Buffy,” Spike said, varying from his usual practice and using her name primarily to irritate Angel. “Kendra, luv, you want a lift back to the motel?”
“No thank you, Mister Spike,” Kendra replied. “I have not run all my miles for today, an’ if I run back to de motel dat will keep me right for my trainin’.”
“Think you could give it a miss seeing as how you’ve just helped save the world and all,” Spike suggested, but Kendra shook her head. “Okay, just you and me then, Slayer.”
“If I might have a word before you depart, Spike?” Giles said. “In private?”
“No problem,” Spike said, and dug out the car keys. He handed them to Buffy. “Wait for me in the car, pet?”
“Thanks, Spike,” Buffy said. She took the keys and walked out. Her shoulders were slumped and she didn’t carry herself like someone who had just saved the world and regained her lost love.
“Ah, Spike, if you would just come this way?” Giles prompted, and Spike tore his eyes from Buffy and followed Giles up the stairs to the book stacks as Jenny busied herself clearing away the materials from the ritual.
“What is it, Watcher?” Spike asked.
“Please, call me Rupert,” Giles invited.
Spike raised an eyebrow. “I’m honored. Ta, Rupert. Got brothers called Edward, Paddington, and Fozzy, have you?”
“Oh, do be serious for a moment,” Giles chided. “I am somewhat concerned by the reactions of Drusilla and Angelus – Angel – after the ensouling spell. It did not go quite as I had envisaged it.”
“S’ppose you’d pictured Angel falling into Buffy’s arms and all living happily ever after,” Spike said.
“Well, yes. Possibly without the ‘happily ever after’ part, perhaps, but I had expected an emotional reconciliation. Drusilla prevented that quite neatly. I wonder, was she consciously manipulating the situation?”
“Damn right she was, Rupert,” Spike stated. “Wouldn’t have thought she’d be compos mentis enough to do it, but she bloody was. Like she was ready for it. Maybe she was. Maybe she had one of her visions about the soul and she had a back-up plan ready and waiting.”
“She was quoting from a song, I think you said?”
“Yeah, Kate Bush. ‘A Woman’s Work’. Sly bitch slipped up and said it in tune. That wasn’t spontaneous.”
Giles frowned. “Wasn’t that song used in a film? How did it go?”
“I can hear you perfectly, you know,” Jenny pointed out from below. “It goes ‘All the things I should have said that I never said, all the things we should have done that we never did, all the things I should have given, but I didn’t, oh darling make it go, make it go away…’ Drusilla was quoting, and you’re right, she slipped into doing it in tune.”
“Should’ve guessed you’d know Kate Bush, pet,” Spike said. “Bet you like Tori Amos too.”
“Not as much, but yes,” Jenny replied. “So, Drusilla was faking it? Did the spell not work?”
“Oh, it worked,” Spike assured her. “Don’t think a soulless vampire could have got that prayer out without choking on it. Just, dunno if a soul guarantees good the way you lot reckon. Not as simple as that.”
“Three months ago I would have dismissed your words out of hand,” Giles said thoughtfully.
“Three months ago, if I was in here, you’d have either been reaching for the crossbow or running like buggery,” Spike grinned.
“Exactly, Spike. You have demonstrated that most of the teachings of the Council are overly simplistic, to say the least.” Giles took off his glasses and sucked on the end of one of the arms. “Do you, then, suspect that Drusilla may still be a threat even with a soul?”
“I think she’s still bloody obsessed with Angel,” Spike said. “Do whatever it takes to get him and to keep him. Long as he stays good, she will too, but dunno as I’d trust her alone with Buffy.” He sighed. “Thought maybe she’d be over him, with a soul. All the things he did to her, bloody awful things, would have thought it was him she’d shy away from. Thought she’d turn back to me, maybe we could sort things out, get back together. Didn’t bloody work out that way.”
“It’s a little soon to be certain of anything,” Giles reminded him.
“Yeah. Well, we’ll see.” Spike sighed again. “Better be going. Buffy’ll be waiting for me in the car.”
“Yes, quite. Goodnight, Spike.”
“’Night, Rupert.” Spike turned and walked away.
As he descended the steps Giles called out to him once more. “Spike? I never thought I’d say this, but – take care of her.”
“I will, mate. I will.”