Chapter 14
Author's Notes: A/N: Hey everyone! Hope all my American friends had a great holiday. :)
Thank you guys so much for your encouragement and enthusiasm over this fic. I’m having such a blast writing it—you all just make it more so.
My thanks to Megan, Tami, Mari, ElizaBuffy, and Jenny as always, for finding all my silly mistakes, offering opinions, and feeding me suggestions.
You all are completely awesome. Thank you!
Sunnydale, California, 1997
So that was the way history would have written it. Had she never made the deal with Paimon, had she not sold herself in the hope of finding her lover again, she would have been immortalized as Elizabeth Travers, victim to William the Bloody. History would have recorded the only man who had ever loved her as her killer. History would have branded him something he was not.
A fond, however heartbreakingly sad smile quirked her lips.
Though certainly not for lack of trying. Giles had done his best to reassure her, saint that he was. He told her records of slayers and their deaths were often fuzzed over. None of the records of final battles had been proven absolutely legitimate. Most watchers became so close to their slayers that memory of their death was too painful to place into words. Often, the details became muddled and confused, sometimes split with the details of another. The lack of accountability in Elizabeth’s history was unfortunate but not uncommon. Nor was identifying the wrong source as her killer.
Encouraging thoughts, those. But she supposed she could understand, in some small way. Of all the details of slayers’ past that Giles shared with her, the pivotal last moments of her fallen sisters had never been among them. Even though she felt the study was worthy of attention if only to avoid the mistakes others had made.
The mistakes she had made.
Buffy inhaled sharply and shivered, her feet making a sharp left turn as she headed through the cemetery. She didn’t feel in the right mind for patrol, but she knew she would be better off out here than at home. Home offered nothing but silence, and silence paved an unwanted path through self-reflection and other dangerous musings. She didn’t want to offer her brain the chance to taunt her with knowledge.
She didn’t want to think about Spike and his mistress. The one whom Angel said he’d loved for over a century. She didn’t want to think about Spike—her William—touching another woman. Kissing another woman. Making love with another woman. Loving another woman. She couldn’t stomach it—her gut tied up in knots and her lungs became stingy with oxygen.
William hadn’t had anyone before her. His love for her had been a first. A first-time experience. There was no grand woman in his past who had filled in the decades of silence with pleasure. It was why he’d been so resistant to fall in love with Buffy in the first place. He hadn’t known what it was, and when he put a name to it, the knowledge that he loved the enemy had nearly torn him apart. He’d responded violently and in haste—not that it had done any good. What was supposed to have been their last fight had
indeed been their last, but they had walked away united instead of broken apart. They had walked away more alive rather than dead.
Would William have loved her if he’d had a woman before her? One he’d loved as Spike loved Drusilla? Or would Buffy not be here at all? If William had loved before her, would her fate have been sealed those three hundred years ago, leaving time unaltered and a different slayer under Giles’s care?
God, she was so foolish. So miserably idiotic. She hadn’t asked for enough and she’d still managed to take too much. Perhaps this was the unspoken price Paimon had collected; the cost of living in a world with William came at the expense of knowing he didn’t love her here, and the looming certainty that he never would.
It was amazing what a little knowledge could do. How far it could go. Buffy heaved a sigh and turned her eyes heavenward, taking in the stars. She was no older now than she had been when she’d first lived, but she felt wiser. The unlocked gates of her mind provided knowledge she would never have appreciated in this life. There were things she looked upon now with shame. Arguments with her mother, the way she so often neglected her friends, the way she flippantly bent the rules around Giles. How she took her support system for granted. How she took everything in her life for granted.
Without her mother, her friends, and her Watcher, she would only be half alive. In some way, simply by existing, they had saved her from the fate she’d been cursed to live as Elizabeth Travers. She didn’t fear Giles in any sense of the word. If anything, Giles was the embodiment of a mentor; the father she wished she’d had. He was someone she could trust. Someone who wouldn’t look upon her unfavorably for decisions which were her own.
Someone who knew and understood that being the Slayer didn’t make one any less human. He didn’t expect her to fork over her life—he just wanted her to respect her duties.
Which she didn’t always do. She’d fled the first time he placed the dusty
Vampyr book before her. Just two weeks ago, she’d lied about feeling ill in order to go to a frat party—a party which, oh yeah, had nearly come at the cost of her life. She constantly referred to her Calling as an occupation rather than the sacred duty it was. She often short-changed patrolling in the hopes of seeing Angel. She fought, sure, and had saved the world once or twice, but that didn’t make her the best she could be.
It made her fortunate.
It was so strange how a simple different set of circumstances could change her world view so drastically. As the Slayer of Kenneth Travers, her strength, her Calling, had been something she resented above all things. At the end she’d wanted nothing to do with it. Nothing at all. After all, it was her strength which had compromised her as the Slayer and labeled her as a devil-worshipper in the eyes of the villagers. It was her strength that had ultimately cost William his life. Her strength, her duty, her Calling.
Though similarly, her Calling had brought them together.
The world was compact with irony.
Likewise, Buffy couldn’t say her attitude this time around had been a beacon of sunshine. She was hardly a good example of an attentive student. And there were times when she resented her sacred responsibility so potently she could spit nails. However, a larger part of her was rooted in morality and the recognition of how important her obligation was to others. Giles had instilled in her such appreciation. Know it or not, he had.
So here she was. A slayer reborn. A girl. No, a woman. A woman now.
A woman with two histories.
A woman in love.
A woman who had gambled everything away for the man who had rescued her from herself.
The man who didn’t know her.
Chills spread down her arms, her butt finding the surface of a gravestone. She didn’t feel like walking anymore.
Foolish to think she’d be safer from her thoughts here than at home. She wasn’t safe anywhere. Not from herself.
“I believe the words you’re looking for are
be careful what you wish for.” Buffy froze and the world froze with her. Her blood stilled. Her heart stopped. The wind fell silent around her. All shadows hardened into stone. The voice harkened with terrifying familiarity. It was one she wagered she would know anywhere. Hearing it once had a way of leaving a permanent mark. Even if Halloween hadn’t opened her eyes to her true past, the voice of the Hell King would have thrown her from her self-constructed abyss and plucked her back into a form of reality no one could deny.
The first time she’d seen Paimon, he’d stood well over seven feet in height, his head adorned with a jeweled crown. That much had not changed. He was still unreasonably tall, still prancing around on proud display as the royalty he was. She didn’t remember much else of him aside from his pale and strikingly effeminate face, and the black robes his body had then been wrapped inside. There were no robes now; rather a tailored suit of fine Armani, complete with shoes that would have most gay men drooling all over themselves. He struck her as a very tall and very deadly David Bowie, and had she not been paralyzed with terror she might have laughed herself silly.
“I admit it a tad cliché,” Paimon continued conversationally, stepping fully out of darkness and under the pale moonlight, making him appear more than ethereal. Making him look, for a split second, like nothing more than a common ghost. He was truly formed from shadows—shadows composed his limbs, sculpted his face, and blended seamlessly into his skin. He was made of them, constructed of them. Born, perhaps, in the night and thus always lurking in silhouettes. The thought made her shudder.
“Cliché?” Buffy repeated. “You take everything from me and call it a cliché?”
Paimon shrugged easily. “I cannot take what you do not willfully bargain.”
“I never wanted this.”
“No? I beg to differ.” A lecherous smile stretched his inhuman lips, his long, gangly legs sweeping a grand step to her left. “You were quite determined when we first met. Do you remember? You gave all away without demanding the price. You were quite adamant about that. Before I could even speak, you forfeited yourself. As long as I did not possess your soul, you seemed more than content to provide the cost of what you asked.” He yielded thoughtfully. “And even so, I believe you would have gambled that as well. Your mortal soul. Your life. Anything and everything you could summon to get your precious William back.”
“Will doesn’t remember me,” Buffy barked, fear giving way to rage. “He doesn’t remember me at
all.” “Ah. Sweet Elizabeth. Lies do not become us.”
“It’s
Buffy now.”
Paimon inclined his head politely. “Buffy,” he agreed. Then paused and added, “Did you like that bit? I thought you might appreciate his name for you becoming the title by which you were known in this life. Call it a gift.”
“Your generosity overwhelms me.”
“I aim to please.”
“He doesn’t
remember me,” she snapped, unwanted tears stinging her eyes. The last thing she wanted to do was give this unholy creature her tears. He had everything else. Blood, her bargain, William’s love—God kill her before she gave him her tears as well. “He doesn’t—”
“Ah, ah. You said it earlier, did you not? You said dear William recognized you.”
“Recognizing me and
remembering me are hardly the same thing, and you damn well know it.”
Paimon didn’t attempt to argue the point. Rather, he offered another apathetic shrug. “You did not ask that he remember you.”
The simplicity and contradiction of this statement had her seething in a blink. Buffy jumped to her feet, seizing the stake she kept tucked between the waist of her trousers and the small of her back. It was a feeble weapon against such power, she knew, but it was all she had. And she was determined to prove she wasn’t afraid.
Even if all of her trembled in dread.
“Wrong answer,” she nearly growled. “Wanna try again?”
The Hell King offered another indifferent shrug, not even blinking at the appearance of a stake in her hands. “You did not ask that he remember you,” he replied. “Nor did you ask that you remember him. All you wanted was William back, and I gave it to you.”
“Will was in love with
me.” Paimon’s malicious eyes sparkled with merriment. “And are you saying it is impossible for William…oh no…I’m sorry,
Spike, to love you? He simply doesn’t know you. I’m sure, given time…”
“He—”
The demon held up a hand. “Enough.”
“You lying—”
There was a break then; the creature laughed. He looked at her and roared with laughter, and the sound was as chilling as anything she’d ever heard. It consumed her, filling the air with the emptiness of sorrow and the sting of loss. It sent shivers of absolute hopelessness down her spine. He mocked her without shame; without a need for shame. He mocked her with openness that left her insides bleeding.
“Imagine that,” he sniggered, rubbing his jaw with pale, near-skeletal fingers. “A thing of Hell, lying to the Chosen warrior of all things virtuous and just. I simply can’t imagine what I was thinking. My apologies, dear
Buffy. I assure you, it won’t happen again.”
“You son of a—”
“Sorry. Forgive me. That was a lie.” He shrugged, laughing still. “I can’t seem to help myself.”
“How would you feel about me ripping out your ribcage?”
“A little disconcerted, seeing as I don’t have one.” Paimon smirked, but the mirth in his eyes was fading rapidly, leaving the ground on which she stood freezing while it burned. The duality of sensation had her terrified, but she refused to blink. She refused to betray anything which could rightfully be construed as fear. He already knew she was terrified—there was no reason to validate what he already knew. “You were a foolish child, Buffy. Perhaps if you had listened to your dear Watcher, you would have learned the value of not making bargains with the Devil.”
“You’re not the Devil,” Buffy spat, the grip on her stake tightening.
Another unmoved shrug. “You say tomato,” he replied. “And truly, dear, I would love to spend my evening catching up, but I have business to tend to. You know: souls to capture, havoc to reap, the virtuous to corrupt. You were an unexpected stop, I admit, but a necessary one. Since you remember everything now—and much sooner than I would have preferred—I have concluded that it is time to collect.”
Everything stopped again. Movement ceased to exist.
“What?” she demanded, her voice suddenly raspy.
“Your debt,” Paimon said simply. “Within one week’s time, I will be collecting your debt.”
Buffy drew in a sharp breath, every corner of her body paralyzed. “You can’t.”
“That’s funny. Your signature on an unbreakable stone begs to differ.”
“You didn’t do what I asked…Will is—”
“Here. As are you. What you mean, dear, is you didn’t ask for all you should have. And you know it. You have admitted as much to yourself and others. Do not lie to me. I am many things, admittedly, and I confess as much with pride. But I always uphold a bargain. You simply didn’t ask for what you truly wanted which, sorry as I am, is not a problem of mine.” Paimon’s head tilted, the slits of his eyes drinking her in. “You threw me off, see. And while the timing is rotten, there’s little more I can do. You know too much now.”
“I know too much?”
“You know yourself. You know Spike. You know the true past rather than the one I forged in your favor.”
A fresh wave of anger rolled within her and she grasped onto it. Anger was good. She liked anger. Anger was preferable to fear in any scenario. “The past wherein you listed Will as my killer, you mean? Big shocker, that. Demons fudge over the details.”
Paimon blinked. “But he was.”
“Ummm, maybe your memory isn’t that fresh, but mine is clear in the crystal sense.”
“Yes, and had it not been for William you wouldn’t have died.” He shrugged again; she was coming to really hate it when he shrugged. “William died and you sold yourself. His death led to yours. It was the inevitable conclusion. Were it not for William, you would not be here. He killed you.” Paimon broke off at that, his brow furrowing in what could be called frustration. “I just hadn’t anticipated the claim.”
At the slightest hint of their blood-link, Buffy felt her veins surge with life and warmth caress the frozen tundra of her heart. The connection they had shared had been so potent, so amazingly powerful. She’d felt everything, save for what he didn’t want her to feel. She’d been denied the sensation of his death. He hadn’t wanted her to feel what he was feeling. He hadn’t wanted her to break anymore than she had already broken.
He’d denied letting her feel him die.
Buffy didn’t know whether his decision made him an angel or a devil. She didn’t care.
All she cared about right now was Spike. Making him remember.
Doing whatever she could to make him know her again.
And the claim—God, the claim. The claim would help. Giles had given her that much hope—hope reiterated now from the devil she would have to outrun.
“Damn,” Paimon breathed, rolling his eyes. “Did I say too much?”
“Just enough, but that’s just me talking.”
“Doesn’t really matter either way, I suppose. These are things you would have eventually discovered on your own.” He paused theatrically. “Were it not for the claim, you wouldn’t have remembered a thing. Claims are especially powerful, you see. More so than demons such as I remember when, oh say, making bargains with grief-stricken slayers. Then again, they are so wretchedly rare that the specifics can’t help but escape us every few millennia. Blood never changes—death cannot eradicate spells, oaths, bargains…or claims. How else do you explain the outstanding debt at your doorstep?”
Buffy shook her head hard, her feet seizing a step backward before her head could catch up with her. “You can’t have it.”
“My sweet, your defiance is charming, but I’m afraid this isn’t a matter of you handing over your debt. It’s a matter of my
taking it. Whenever I like. However I like. You won’t see it coming and you won’t be able to stop me.” He grinned. “The timing, as I said, is off, but no matter. I’m sure I can put it to use during the next apocalypse.”
She swallowed. She didn’t wish to betray how hard she was shaking but she couldn’t seem to help herself. Her walls had collapsed and she was on full display. There for the viewing. The useless stake in her grip was covered with a cold coat of sweat, and she held it so tight it might well never leave her hand again. “There was an apocalypse,” she pointed out. “Why not then?”
“You mean the Master? The Hellmouth?” Paimon shook his head and took another step forward. “Child’s play. To waste what you signed into my ownership on something so…well, easily avertable…it wouldn’t be a smart investment, now would it?”
He caught her eyes again and for an unbearably long minute, everything around them ceased. Everything. There were no trees. No headstones. No soil beneath her feet. No town surrounding them. There was nothing at all. She looked into his eyes and saw flames licking his pupils—saw the silhouetted dance of a thousand terrible things. At once the sound around her was deafening with the shrieks of millions. Her heart galloped so fast she feared it might explode within her chest. Her skin grew hot and slick, as though trying to escape her bones. It only lasted a few seconds but the effect would remain with her forever—the sting of fire, the sorrow of Hell. Everything he’d shown her by simply inviting her into his eyes.
“Until next time, my lovely Elizabeth.”
Something scalding brushed her cheek, and then he was gone. Melting back into the shadows, which latched onto him as though he were a favorite cousin. He was there one second and gone the next. He was gone, and she was again left to cold.
It took long minutes to gather her bearings. Buffy remained stationary, her chest heaving, her hungry lungs gulping down air. Her skin was numb but there. Her heart raced but didn’t abandon her. And when she raised her hand to her cheek to make sure he hadn’t burned her with his kiss, there was nothing but the smooth feel of her flesh. No scar. No raw, angry mark. Nothing.
Buffy heaved a long sigh, her wobbly legs at last complying with her need to move.
She was so shaken she didn’t feel him. Didn’t sense him. Didn’t even hear him. And when she turned, she found herself once again captured in a man’s eyes.
Only there was no damnation here.
“Will,” she breathed. The air around them hummed in pleasure at the sound of his name.
There was nothing at first. Spike remained motionless—the picture of a man whose words had just been robbed from his tongue. He looked, for all the world, simply stunned by the sight of her.
He just looked at her, and she looked back.
Then, at last, there were words.
“Hello, cutie.”
TBC
…..*hides*