Summary: A slayer barters with a demon to rescue her lover, and finds herself unwittingly projected nearly three hundred years into the future with no memory of the life she left behind.
The dreams had grown stronger since arriving in Sunnydale. There was no point in denying it—denial did not make the truth any less significant. Denial didn’t make the dreams vanish. Denial didn’t do anything but exacerbate an unmovable fact. The dreams were growing stronger, more frequent; he was lucky now to escape a single night without a visit from his nocturnal angel. And perhaps he wouldn’t be so concerned about the dreams had the faceless woman remained faceless. The dreams had been with him since infancy—always the same thing, always the same woman. Always the same everything.
Only now they had a face.
And the face looked frighteningly similar to the Slayer.
Spike honestly didn’t know what to make of it. Not once had the phantom woman in his psyche assumed the persona of a woman in his life. Not when he was an awkward teenager in middleclass London, not when Drusilla rescued him from mediocrity, and certainly in neither of the two instances in which he’d hunted down and bathed his hands in slayer blood.
The fact that something consistent in his life had suddenly turned inconsistent didn’t really bother him; it was unusual, yes, but not unheard of.
No. What bothered him was the dreams were the only remnants of his human days which had carried over into the twentieth century. The only thing he relied upon when Drusilla was too weak to respond to his amorous touch, or when his sire’s emotional distancing left him in the uncomfortable reality of how alone he truly was. The dreams brought a woman. A woman composed of poetry and shining with light. A woman whom, in his youth, he’d assumed was his guardian angel. Adulthood had transformed the romantic notion into a proverbial pipe-dream; his subconscious telling him what sort of woman he truly wanted. Vampirism had molded the interpretation into the pinnacle of desires: what he needed in Drusilla but never received. What he wanted more than anything—a perfect, nonexistent being who would complete every hollow crevice of his worn body.
Suddenly, the angel of night had transformed into something else entirely.
Suddenly she looked like the Slayer.
It was bizarre the way it happened. Spike had always seen a young woman with emerald eyes. Her hair was dark brown—the color he now assumed was Buffy Summers’s natural shade. Her smile was infectious, her laughter addictive. Her skin tasted like honey and smelled of raspberries; her lips were soft and warm, her tongue a golden caress against his own. Her skin felt like cashmere beneath his touch, and her body molded against his as though they had been fashioned together.
There was power in her hands and loyalty in her heart. And the love she gave him in a single glance bent time and reshaped realities.
None of that had changed. The only thing that was different was that her face carried over now. It hadn’t before. He’d always awaken from the dreams with a vague recollection of what had occurred—of what he’d seen and experienced. He’d feel her skin beneath his hands and taste her kiss for the day’s duration, but her face always eluded him. He recognized her instantly at night, of course, but never during the day.
Not until now.
At night. Every night. Ever since he met her outside that bloody alley, there was the Slayer. The Slayer was his woman. The one to comfort him in the lonely emptiness of night. The one who stroked his cheeks and whispered soothingly into his ears. The one who encouraged him to rest his head in her lap so she could stroke his hair.
It was bloody outrageous.
More than that—it was insane.
It had to stop.
Spike knew he wasn’t helping matters. His obsession with the Slayer had exploded beyond his reckoning. He wanted more than anything to snap her neck and be done with the whole sordid affair. The fact that the idea alone made him feel nauseous was more than enough reason to proceed with her regularly scheduled death. The sooner Buffy Summers was out of his unlife, the better. Perhaps her face would fade and the nightly angel would return to him, enigmatic and distant. A proverbial woman who did not exist.
He tried to tell himself he was watching the videos his lackey had made to study her moves for that very purpose.
He wasn’t getting very far in convincing himself.
“Here it comes,” Spike said to the room, his body tightening with excitement. Annoyance that she was, no one could deny the Slayer was pure poetry in motion. Her body twisted like lyrics come to life. The fiery, seductive determination on her face served as a walking aphrodisiac. He licked his lips and inhaled sharply, nodding to the nearest lackey. He could watch this all sodding day and not get bored. Say what you would about the Slayer; she was gorgeous. So bloody gorgeous.
And so bloody off-limits.
“Rewind that,” Spike instructed the lackey, not taking his eyes away from the screen. “Let’s see that again.”
The tape backtracked a few frames. He strolled to a different screen, exhilaration pumping his dead veins. He masked his inappropriate reaction with a chuckle, though he doubted any of the cronies around him would have mistaken his shudder for anything but desire. “She’s tricky,” he drawled. “Baby likes to play.”
On the telly, the Slayer fell hard against a makeshift fence in the Sunnydale pumpkin patch, and even though he’d seen it a thousand times, Spike still grinned at her quick recovery. Buffy was on her feet in an instant, snapping off a piece of the fence and shoving it through her attacker’s heart. She had no way of knowing that the vampire was there on a suicide mission, of course, or that every second of her battle was being recorded for the purpose of uncovering and exploiting a weakness. The vampire-attacker hadn’t held back—if he had, the tape would be worthless. Rather, he’d been sent after the Slayer without knowing his was a suicide mission. Spike had known his lackey wouldn’t return. The lackey in question hadn’t known it until the second before he tasted dust.
There was something addictive about being the local vamp mob-boss. He could get used to this.
Even if cronies and giant master plans weren’t his forte. No, Spike much preferred the lonely road. As long as he had blood in his stomach and Drusilla at his side, not to mention a spot of violence every night and something catchy on the telly, he was a satisfied bloke.
He wasn’t the sort to sit at home and plan the apocalypse. No, that was Angelus…before Angelus turned into a ninny lapdog. Spike was in Sunnydale for one reason and one reason only: restore Drusilla to her former glory. He’d off the Slayer, guzzle her blood, snack on her friends for dessert, and the world would be set right again.
“You see that?” Spike said loudly, doing his best to ignore the internal angry growl of his demon. Sodding thing was getting wonkier by the day. The Slayer’s death was cause for celebration. Maybe there was something in the water. It was the Hellmouth, after all.
Not that he drank the water, but he was reasonably certain the blighters he offed did.
And if he’d learned anything from Woodstock…
Spike shook his head, belatedly realizing he’d paused in mid-thought. “The way she stakes him with that thing?” he continued, gesturing to the telly. “That’s what’s called resourceful. Rewind it again.”
“Miss Edith needs her tea,” Drusilla singsonged from the other room, waltzing over the threshold.
He turned rapidly, a guilty flash warming his cheeks. He was able to quell it just as quickly, but knowledge had a funny way of remaining long after initial sparks had vanished. “C’mere, poodle,” he said, extending his hand to hers.
He tried bloody hard not to compare her cold, fragile touch to the warm, strong touch of his night angel. It was unfair—it wasn’t right. Never before had the dreams disrupted his life. The life he led between sleeps. The life with Dru.
Now he was holding his love’s hand and wishing she were someone else.
There was nothing at all right with this picture.
As though reading his mind, which he was almost certain she had, Drusilla cooed, “Do you love my insides? The parts you can’t see?”
Spike swallowed hard. “Eyeballs to entrails, my sweet,” he replied, nodding fiercely at the telly. “That’s why I’ve got to study this slayer. Once I know her I can kill her.” He bloody well hoped. “An’ once I kill her, you can have your run of Sunnyhell. Get strong again.”
Once he killed her, she’d no longer haunt him.
Only he didn’t say that part.
“Don’t worry,” Drusilla breathed, and for one horrible instant he thought she truly had read his mind. A fear which lapsed the next second. “Everything’s switching. Outside to inside.” A small gale of cool, dead air hit his neck. “It makes her weak.”
Weak. Weak.
The Slayer weak. Now that was something he could get into.
“Really?” he demanded eagerly. “Did my pet have a vision?”
“Do you know what I miss?” Drusilla asked airily. “Leeches.”
“Come on,” he probed, his hands taking hold of her waist. Again he tried to wane off comparison between her cool frigid body and his night angel’s warm, welcoming embrace. Again he failed. “Talk to Daddy. This thing that makes the Slayer weak…when is it?”
His dark princess averted her eyes as though embarrassed. It was rot, he knew. Dru never got embarrassed. She danced naked in the moonlight—often when she knew mums and little tykes would be around to see her in full glory. No, Dru was anything but modest. “Tomorrow,” she replied softly.
Spike frowned. “Tomorrow’s Halloween,” he argued. “Nothing happens on Halloween.”
She shook her head, meeting his eyes again. “Someone’s come to change it all,” she whispered excitedly.
Spike blinked at her, his mind racing to mesh her words with reality.
And then a silver light of knowledge.
Change could be a very, very good thing.
And the way things were going, he could use all the change he could get.
*~*~*
The air tasted different. Balmy. Warm. Humid. It was not the air of home. The air she knew so well. The air which had breathed life into her worn, tired body more times than she cared to consider. Nights in her village had been kissed with cold. Often while waiting for the dead to rise, she would entertain herself by observing the curious swirl of her breath as she did her best to keep warm. Warmth was not a concern once battle broke out, of course. More often than not, Elizabeth relied on adrenaline to keep her body heated.
At least in the beginning. After William, she didn’t need to search for heat. Heat found her.
William…
Elizabeth blinked wearily, a tired, pained moan whimpering through her lips. It seemed her body had betrayed her. She was on the ground, her back propped against what felt like a tree. Screams ripped through the balmy air—screams of what sounded like hundreds. She felt a shudder of old fortitude and forced her eyes to remain open. Not that it did much good—her vision was blurred. There was nothing discernible about her location. Nothing but a hodgepodge of shapes and colors; faceless blurs racing across an unknown terrain in a place she’d never before ventured.
Demons. These were the cries of demons.
Elizabeth gasped and shot to her feet, shaking her head hard to clear her murky vision. Endless seconds passed until the scene before her hardened into something tangible, and even then she remained irrefutably lost.
This was unlike anything she’d encountered—anything that could be construed as a slip of reality. This was no reality. Lights. No trees. A rampage of demons and crowds of panicked humans in bizarre clothing scurrying into the most curiously illuminated cottages she’d ever seen.
Witchcraft.
The word sent a dark shudder down her spine and her resolve fortified.
The last thing she recalled was the face of a demon lord. One she’d summoned. She’d been on her back, drowning in her own blood. He hadn’t allowed her wound to heal itself. Her inherent super-strength should have guaranteed her survival beyond the offering of blood, but Paimon had denied her. It was just as well; the sooner her life ended, the sooner she could be reborn.
The sooner she and William could be reunited.
Reunited.
Elizabeth glanced down to herself. She was wearing some god-awful dress that only Kenneth could have selected for her. He’d gone through a phase in her adolescence in which he’d tried to dress her up as a live doll—present her as the perfect young lady to those around them. To protect her, or so he said. To ensure that no one would ever dream of connecting the violence of the night to the sweet girl in the pretty dress.
So she was dressed to please the locals.
And the locals were running around screaming with demons from all walks of life hot on their heels.
She was not home. She was far from home.
Paimon had inserted her into a society far from her own. Her body felt the same. When she looked down, she saw her hands. When she spoke, she heard her voice. She fisted handfuls of her own hair and recognized the familiar contours of her face as her fingers explored what she could not see.
Everything was there. She was Elizabeth Travers.
She was here.
“Buffy!”
Her heart leapt into her throat. She’d never heard that name colored in a woman’s voice. She’d never heard anyone save her beloved breathe it to life. Elizabeth’s stomach clenched and she whirled around, her eyes landing on an exuberant redhead who was dressed like…well, she’d never seen anyone dressed in so little. Not in public, anyway. Perhaps this was some modern version of a streetwalker.
But that was neither here nor there. What truly mattered was the name she’d called her.
“My gorgeous li’l slayer.” A lick of his tongue across her quivering skin. Her insides pooled into desire, and she reached for him with trembling hands. He grinned in kind and kissed her lips, his hands framing her face. “My sweet Buffy.”
Buffy.
How did this girl know her name? The name only William knew?
The name William had given her.
“Buffy?” she replied, indignant. “What sort of name is Buffy?”
“Your name.”
“I prefer Elizabeth, thank you very much.”
“Elizabeth is the Slayer,” William countered, his calloused fingers tugging expertly at her hard nipples, his mouth exploring the creamy flesh of her throat. “The Slayer is not welcome here.”
“I am always the Slayer,” she replied, her words little more than a dreamy gasp. She thrust her hips hard against his and melted when he growled and thrust back. She’d grown addicted to the hard feel of him between her thighs, rubbing her with reckless disregard to anyone who might find them.
“Not here, you’re not,” William replied simply, wheedling a hand between them. “With me…you’re…mmm…”
“Unh…”
“You’re…” His fingers pried her vaginal lips apart and slipped across her swollen, tender pearl. He favored her with a cocky wink. “Buffy.”
She fought the urge to laugh. “I am not.”
“You’re Buffy. You’re my Buffy.”
“I bloody well am not!”
William’s dancing eyes glazed over her face, wandering southward until he was staring at her breasts. “You most certainly are,” he told her heaving bosom. “You should see it from this angle.”
“Will—”
“You’re mine, an’ I’ll call you whatever I bloody well like.” He grinned and tickled her lips with his tongue, the fingers at her pussy massaging her throbbing clitoris into a new form of madness. “You’re Buffy.”
“You’re nutty.”
“Love tends to turn a bloke wonky, yeah? ‘Specially a bloke who falls for the enemy.” He nuzzled her throat tenderly and pressed a kiss against the sacred mark blushing her flesh. “You’re my Buffy, darling. Accept it.”
Elizabeth’s vision blurred, another gasp clawing for freedom. Around him, air seemed in short supply. “I might need some…convincing,” she conceded, feeling very wanton and rather unapologetic about it.
William met her eyes, the demon in his all but purring with pleasure. “Oh kitten,” he growled, his hand abandoning her center to free his cock. “You know how I feel about challenges.”
“Remind me.”
The redhead was at her side now. She attempted to grab Elizabeth’s arm, but her hand whipped right through her skin as though made of nothing. But even that didn’t faze the Slayer; it was the fact that the girl was still calling her Buffy.
William’s name for her.
“Buffy, are you okay?” the streetwalker demanded.
The streetwalker was not alone. A man in strange clothing and a wicked-looking musket was at her side. Elizabeth’s eyes sized up the weapon covetously. She would have to find a way to get her hands on that.
Perhaps this was a test. Perhaps Paimon meant for her to rescue William from these people.
Or perhaps these people were truly allies. Perhaps she was supposed to rescue William from the monsters around them.
Perhaps this was Hell.
“This could be a situation,” the man stated by way of greeting.
The streetwalker looked petrified, but was quite adamant on the familiarity of their acquaintance. “Buffy, what do we do?” she asked fearfully.
The words were innocuous enough, but they fueled her with a strange sense of authority.
These were allies. And they’d just made her their leader.
“Well, I think it’s obvious,” Elizabeth said firmly. “We find William.”