The shadows were growing long when Tara arrived back at the Summers home.  She slid her key in and discovered that the front door was already unlocked.  She frowned.  Dawn wouldn't be back from Lisa's until the very last strike of ten if past experience were any guide, and she'd left Willow at the Magic Box.  In Sunnydale, it was sometimes easy to forget about the mundane dangers of burglary, but the VCR would be just as gone whether smashed by a rampaging demon or stolen by an ordinary human being desperate for drug money.  At least it sounded like Buffy was downstairs; she could hear the muted babble of the TV.  "Buffy?"

"M’in here," came a voice from the living room.

Buffy sounded different, the overwhelming determination and confidence of the previous day leached out of her voice.  She sounded, in fact, small and sad and lost.  Tara set her backpack down and shot the deadbolt behind her as she came in.  She walked into the living room, where Buffy sat in the middle of the couch, wrapped up in her bathrobe, damp hair straggling round her shoulders.  The room was dark save for the phosphor glow of the TV.  All the curtains were drawn.  The wintery afternoon sunlight was nowhere near strong enough to penetrate the gloom.  Buffy was cradling a decimated carton of chocolate chip ice cream in her lap and staring at the television as if her life depended on it.  The distant, detached expression of the last month was nowhere in evidence.  Her lower lip trembled slightly and her eyes were liquid with emotion.

Ordinarily Tara would have found that encouraging, but that the emotion was prompted by the Weather Channel scrolling a list of high temperatures for the day in each of the fifty states was a little worrisome. "Are you busy?"  Obviously not, but... "I wanted to talk to you privately about--"

Buffy smiled lopsidedly and jammed her spoon into the middle of the slowly melting remnants of her ice cream.  "So you're the first up, huh?  I guess I was expecting this."  She summoned up the determined look again.  "Yes, I know exactly what I--I..."  Her voice broke and she burst into silent, quivering tears.
 Tara half-tripped over the corner of the coffee table getting to the couch.  "Buffy--what's the matter?"  Would asking if this were Spike-related (and what else could it possibly be?) make things better or worse?  She took a seat on the arm of the couch.  "Are y-you--"

"I'm f-fine--" A fresh bout of sobs overtook Buffy, and Tara held her shaking shoulders for several minutes until they subsided.  At last Buffy took a deep gasping breath and straightened up, wiping her reddened eyes on the sleeve of her robe.  "I'm sorry.  I don't know what's wrong with me."  She looked down at her lap as if she hoped for answers in the rivulets of melting ice cream.  "I felt great when I got home, and I went up to take a shower, and came down here to see what the forecast was, and..."  She gulped a little.  "I just happened to look at the picture."  She waved at the TV, and for a second Tara was confused; then she realized that Buffy was referring to the little gold-framed photo of Joyce Summers sitting on top rather than to the screen.  "I miss Mom."

Tara had long ago finished mourning her own mother's death, but there were times and circumstances which could still make her eyes ache and the back of her throat grow taut.  "That's normal," she said.  "It's only been a couple of months for you.  The rest of us have had longer to...adjust."

"She hated me being the Slayer, did you know?"

That was something Tara never suspected.  "Did she?  She always seemed to take it so gracefully."

Buffy gave a rueful little laugh.  "When she first found out she told me I wasn't welcome in her house if I kept it up.  Of course I kinda picked the worst possible time to tell her about it--Spike had just offered to help me take down Angelus."  Tara blinked; she hadn’t known that Spike had been in on that.  Buffy twiddled the spoon around in the ice cream.  "Mom got better with it.  I wish now I'd told her from the start.  It would have made a lot of things so much easier... all the trouble I got into at school, explaining Angel..." She sighed.  "Maybe not.  Mom never liked him, even before she found out he was a vampire."

Tara wondered if it was safe to turn off the TV, or at least change channels.  "I never would have guessed--about your mom, I mean.  She always got along so well with Spike."

"I know.  Irony much?  My mother hates my one true love and invites my mortal enemy in for cocoa."  Her eyes softened, the grey-green going misty.  "And Spike really liked her.  I'd come home from the dorm to visit sometimes and find him over here with her, talking about those dumb soaps or whining about Dru.  He'd even listen to her stories about the gallery and pretend to be interested.  I wish--I wish she were still here."  Her lower lip was trembling again.  "I wish I could talk about this with her.  She'd probably freak--she liked Spike, but she was so happy when Angel left and I started dating Riley.  A nice, human guy.  Someone I could have a so-called normal life with."  A snort.  "That turned out well."

"Normal lives are over-rated."

"I keep telling myself that.  It's just weird to hear someone agree with me."

Tara shrugged.  "I grew up liking girls in a small town.  If you think my family was down on witches, you should have heard Dad’s opinions on, quote, uppity dykes."  Buffy looked startled.  Didn’t think I knew that word, did you?  I know a lot of things.  Tara looked over at the other woman, debating her next words.  "Buffy... what I said before about why you were kissing Spike--or doing anything else to Spike--not being my business, I meant it.  It doesn't--can I have some of that ice cream?"

"Sure."  Buffy handed her the spoon.

"Thanks."  She took a spoonful and licked the drips off.  Not butter pecan, but it would do.  "Whatever’s between you and Spike doesn’t change anything about the way I look at you.  You're a grown-up, and besides that, you're a--" She paused, trying to make sure she had the right word. "--responsible person.  One of the most responsible people I know.  I know you fight it a lot, but when it comes down to it I've never seen you back away.  So whatever you've decided to do with your life... I can't believe that it's anything that will hurt others.  And whether or not you hurt yourself, or-or Spike--that's your risk to take, and his."

Buffy buried her face in her hands for a second, then straightened and tucked the strands of water-darkened hair behind her ears.  "Thank you.  God, I'm so messed up!"  She wiped her nose.  "I've been sitting here for two hours and one minute I'm high as a kite and Spike's the best thing that ever happened to me, and the next minute I'm completely convinced that I'm insane.  Hence, ice cream therapy, only partially successful.  I'll be OK.  I think."  She turned on Tara with eyes full of panicky intensity and grabbed her arm.  Tara suppressed a wince.  "Don't tell Will about this, please--keep it a private meltdown?  She's already so worried about whether or not I'm happy or sad or--I slept with Spike.  I know it's crazy.  I mean, not completely dense, here!  How do I explain to Dawn's caseworker that she can't meet my new boyfriend today because he tends to burst into flames?  Oh, my God.  I called him my boyfriend.  What am I thinking?  How can I think when he's being all--all Spike at me!?  I--"

Tara grabbed the spoon, dug it into the carton of ice cream, and shoved it into Buffy's mouth.  Buffy's eyes bugged out at the sudden chill.  She held her breath for a good ten seconds, let it out in an ungraceful through-the-nose snort, and with a supreme effort of will, swallowed.  Tara watched her.  "Are you OK for a minute?"

She gave Tara a watery smile.  "Uh.  Yeah.  Thanks.  No guarantees for the minute after that, though.  It's all been so--so flat since I got back, like nothing touches me."  She caught her lower lip in her teeth.  "But when I touch him... everything makes sense.  I feel like I fit into the world again.  Even if it hurts."  There was a look of concentrated wonder in those grey-green eyes, and Tara got the feeling that she was never again going to see Buffy this unguarded.  "Have you ever felt like that?"

Tara thought of Willow, sitting cross-legged on the floor in the middle of a pile of books.  "Yes.  Yes, I've felt like that."

Buffy nodded.  "So does that cover what you wanted to talk to me about?"

Tara's mouth twitched into a smile.  "Not even close.  I wanted to talk to you about Willow."

"Oh."  Buffy's ears went a little red, to match her nose.  "I am Buffy the Walking Ego, hear me roar.  What about Will?"

Tara dropped her eyes to her hands.  "I left her at the Magic Box--"

"Is that safe, considering what she came up with the last time you left her alone at the Magic Box?"  Buffy asked in lighter tones.

Unhappiness welled up inside her, and Tara nodded.  "Very safe.  That's what I needed to talk to you about.  You're counting on Willow to come up with a spell to cure these people, and that--th-that may not be possible."

A small crease appeared between Buffy's brows.  "You mean, there may not be a spell that can do the job?  But Wills had an idea just before Spike and I, uh, left yesterday.  Didn't it pan out?"

"It's not that--Willow may be able to create a working spell, I don't know.  The problem is..."  This was proving harder than she'd anticipated; there was a dreadful sense of betrayal in telling Buffy this without Willow's knowledge.  "I don't think she'll be able to cast it.  Bringing you back the way she did--the Raising was an incredibly powerful spell.  Normally it's performed by a circle of five or more adepts, and powered by at least ten sacrifices, human and vampire.  Willow got around all that, using Dawn's blood and Spike's soul."  As much as Tara had disapproved of the spell, she had to admit that Willow had crafted it brilliantly--in concept, at least; as happened too often for comfort, Willow's execution had contained a few flaws.  "But that means that a lot more of the power had to come from the caster--Willow.  That would have been draining enough, but then the spell went wrong.  She poured every bit of magic in her into closing that portal."

"Right," Buffy said, with an understanding nod.  "And she's been recuperating ever since."

"No."  Tara's voice sounded wretched in her own ears.  "That's the trouble.  It's been a month, and she's showing no signs of recovery at all.  She can cast simple spells, but she burns out almost immediately.  I mean, she blew herself out for the day opening a door.  When Tanner grabbed her, she had nothing left."  Each word grew heavier on her tongue, but she forced them out anyway.  "It could be months before she recovers.  Or years.  Or... maybe never.  I just don't know.  But I'm pretty certain she's not going to be up to casting a spell to restore the sanity of a dozen or more people any time soon."

Buffy's expression flickered from worried to grim as she spoke, and Tara surmised that Oh, poor Will! was doing mortal battle with Hah, serves her right! in Buffy's head.  "Oh.  Wow.  I never realized... great.  We can't just let these guys run wild and free.  Oooh, wait!"  She gave an excited little bounce.  "This Tanner person's only dangerous because he's a wizard of some kind--is there a way to short-circuit his magical talents?  So he won't be able to cast the crazy-making spell?"

"Maybe... some kind of curse?"  Tara rubbed her mouth, frowning.  "I hate messing around with curses, though.  You pretty much have to leave the target an out when you construct it, and when they find it--and sooner or later they usually do--it always comes back to get you."
 Buffy made a face.  "Mmm... you should really have a talk with some gypsies of my acquaintance."

"Maybe a geas.  Those are tricky, but they're not malevolent.  It'll have to be something that I stand a chance of casting on my own."

"Does Willow..."

Tara sighed and shook her head.  "I know she knows she's not getting better, and I know she's scared.  We haven't talked about it much.  I just... I don't want to come off all 'I told you so!'  She's feeling miserable enough about it already." She scraped up the last of the ice cream.  "Now that we've had dessert I guess I'd better get dinner started.  Willow will be home soon."  She couldn't afford to pay Buffy much rent, so she liked to make up the difference in other ways, and besides, she was the only really good cook of the four of them.  Buffy attacked the job as though planning a meal were the culinary equivalent of the Battle of Gettysburg, Willow only baked when she was feeling guilty about something, and Dawn...  "Um... what do you want to do with that leftover hot dog-macaroni-ketchup casserole?"
 Buffy stuck a finger down her throat.  "The usual.  Pack it up and smuggle it off to Spike."

"You hate him that much, huh?"

Buffy snickered, got to her feet and started for the stairs.  "I don't care what he claims, anyone who can eat Dawn's cooking and enjoy it is not possessed of working taste buds."  She ran a hand through her damp hair.  "Ooh, look at the time.  If I want to be ready for patrol by six I'm going to have surrender to the sinister allure of blow-drying."  She headed for the stairs and stopped on the lowest step, hanging off the bannister. "Do you need help with dinner?"

"No, that's fine," Tara assured her.  "Not like I'm cooking for twenty.  It's just going to be hamburgers tonight."

"Coolness.  Hey--make an extra one for me for after patrol, OK?  Or maybe two.  I think we're going to be hungry."

         Xander squinted against the late afternoon sun as he trudged through the graveyard, examining the neat columns of figures on the bill Anya had given him.  Shelf, storage, six-foot, one, $79.95.  Chest, mahogany, 3 cu. ft. cap., one, $244.95.  Jars, storage, 1 qt., twelve, $2.99 ea.  Jars, storage, 8 oz., twenty-four, $1.99 ea.  Bottle, djinni for the use of, one, $24.95.  Djinni, one, priceless...

He'd devoted a sizeable portion of the afternoon to helping Anya clean up the basement and forcing himself not to speculate on his eventual fate had any of his long-ago Buffy-fantasies ever come to fruition.  He'd survived one night with a Slayer, but he had no illusions that 'survived' was not the operative word in describing his tryst with Faith, and she'd been playing nice... for Faith.  No, best just close his eyes and think of baseball, and not about what a pair of inhumanly strong people in the throes of passion could possibly have been doing to leave a head-sized hole in a cement-block wall...

He crumpled up the bill and stuffed it in the pocket of his slacks, trying to ball up his resentment with it.  He and Anya'd had another fight before he'd given in and consented to run this hopeless errand.  In the unlikely event that Spike consented to pay for the damages, ten to one the money to do so would be liberated from Xander's own pockets, and Anya knew damned well that Buffy could barely afford to keep her utility bills paid.  Let's face it, their combined assets are about enough to go down to the corner and buy a stick of gum.
        Their assets?  Ugh, had he actually started thinking of Spike and Buffy as a them?  He was supposed to shudder at this point, but no one was there to see him do it, and the truth was he didn't know exactly how to feel.  That was mildly disturbing.  Vampires = Bad was the cornerstone of his philosophy of life, had been for the past six years.  See vampire, stake vampire.  Very simple, until Angel came along with his anomalous soul and his brooding cow eyes and his Neanderthal brow and his air of mystery and danger, and all of a sudden Buffy was in love with him, and he was an exception.  Until exceptional Angel lost the soul, killed Jenny, kidnaped Dawn, and left Buffy a walking shadow of herself.  Xander kicked a tombstone in passing, a bit harder than he'd intended, and bit back a yelp as a stab of pain penetrated his work boots. Despite the horror of it all Xander hadn't been able to help but feel that the world was back on kilter: Vampires bad.

Spike should have been easier to deal with.  He wasn't any kind of exception.  He was your standard issue bloodsucker, sans soul, sans conscience, sans remorse.  Up until last fall Spike had made no bones about the fact that he hated them all and would return to trying to kill them the moment something happened to the chip in his head.  Spike = Bad, If Occasionally Useful.

Xander wished that it were easier to remember that these days, that he didn't keep falling prey to unexpected moments of sympathy for the Bleached Wonder, or that Buffy hadn't looked so contented earlier, and not in that sappy, spell-induced way, either.  He couldn't say that he liked the vampire, and it was for damn certain that Spike didn't like him, but they'd gotten used to each other over the last year, and familiarity bred... something that made the two of them not completely disinclined towards one another's company.  If they spent most of their time snapping at one another, well, everyone needed a hobby.

It lacked several hours till sunset, but the crypt was already shrouded in purple shadow, thanks to several strategically planted cypresses.  Xander glanced at the windows; a few candles glowed, but there was no movement behind them.  Normally Spike was up and about at this hour, watching television or doing some mysterious vampire thing.  He banged perfunctorily on the door to the crypt and then gave it a shove, rattling the chain--what was the good of having a padlock, he thought, if Spike never locked the damned thing?  Half the demon population of Sunnydale out to skin him, and anyone could just walk in.  The vampire had the brains of a kumquat.  He entered the crypt and looked around, then yelled, "Hey!  Dead Man Walking!  Getcher undead ass up here!  Got something for you!"

After a few minutes the sound of booted feet on the stairs echoed up from below, and Spike's pale head appeared out of the opening leading to the lower level.  Xander blinked as Spike's shoulders emerged; he was wearing a long-sleeved shirt in vibrant scarlet over his customary black t-shirt, a style Spike hadn't affected since he'd shrunk the last one he'd owned in Xander's washing machine almost two years ago.  He was carrying a couple of moldy-looking books in the crook of one arm and tucking a small, oddly-shaped object into his shirt-pocket.

"Holidays coming up," the vampire drawled in response to Xander's unasked question.  "I'm feeling festive."  He tossed the books down on a table and looked Xander up and down with a belligerent smirk.  "My, don't we look all splotchy and possessive!  Come to deliver the obligatory touch-her-and-I'll stake-you speech?  Snap it up, then, Harris, I've got things--and people--to do tonight."  He strutted up to Xander, the smirk growing even more obnoxious.  "Or do we fancy fisticuffs?  Little punch in the nose to make us feel extra manly?  Sorry, that's the Slayer's private preserve, but tell you what--I'll give you a free shot at the rest of the phiz."

Xander's fingers twitched fistwards.  Screw moments of sympathy; once an evil soulless bastard, always an evil soulless bastard.  He rocked back on his heels and stared down at Spike (and how annoying was it that it had taken a year for him to realize that the undead jerk was shorter than he was?) and savored the fact that it didn't matter that his merely human strength would make about as much impact on Spike's jaw as throwing beanbags; unlike those poor crazy saps, Xander knew how to throw a punch and how to dodge one.  He could just keep hitting until Spike broke or his knuckles did.  Or better yet, grab one of the bits of faux-Gothic statuary scattered around the crypt and pound the asshole's skull in.  And Spike wouldn't be able to do a damned thing about it; if he tried he'd be knocked on his ass, brain-fried courtesy of the U.S. Army--God bless the U.S.A.  In fact, he could do anything he wanted to to Spike...

...And Spike knew it.  He could see it in the vampire's eyes, bravado covering the wincing anticipation of the blow to come, the blow he couldn't fight off, and not just because of the chip.  The same look, almost, he'd seen in the mirrors of the boys' restroom before a hundred confrontations with whichever bully wanted to knock Xander Harris's block off that week.  The look which meant that if you couldn't avoid the pain, you'd damned well take it on your own terms.

Xander kept his expression blank.  "Nah.  I've got something way worse than that."  He reached into his pocket and saw Spike tense, real fear flickering into his eyes--was there really a stake in there?  Slowly, Xander drew the bill out and handed it to the vampire.  "Paid in full by the end of January, buster.  Or Anya'll hand it over to a demon bill collector."

Hah.  He'd floored a vampire.  Add that to the Harris resume.  Spike stared at the bill, then back at Xander, then back at the bill, the fact that Xander wasn't going to beat the shit out of him slowly seeping through his skull.  He pulled a half-empty pack of Marlboros out of his shirt pocket, from behind whatever it was he'd stuck in there on the way upstairs, tapped one out, lit it on the nearest candle-flame, and took a cool-restoring drag.  He held up the note and waved it.  "Thanks, Harris.  I've been thinking of rolling my own, and this is the perfect size."

"You think I'm joking about Anya and money?"

Spike snorted smoke.  "Oi, just beat me up yourself, won't you?  Easier all around."

Xander coughed, a snide comment about the cigarettes on the tip of his tongue, and then realized that there was far more smoke in the air than could be accounted for by Spike's bad habits or a few cheap candles.  Trading looks of confusion, the two of them headed for the crypt door.  The diffuse afternoon light dimmed further as they reached it, to the point that Spike risked several steps outside.  He looked up, almost losing his cigarette as his jaw dropped.  "Bloody hell."  Xander shoved past him and tilted his own head back, following the vampire's stunned gaze upwards.

It must have been a hundred feet long.  It had no wings, but it rode the wind nonetheless, a sinuous river of gold-rimmed scarlet scales undulating across the sky, blotting out the sun.  Five-clawed talons slashed the air.  Its be-whiskered and horned head lashed from side to side, trailing fantastic streamers and filaments of silver and gold.  Smoke rolled from its flaring nostrils and the immense goggle eyes rolled downwards as the creature spotted them and paused in mid-air, absurdly graceful.  The filaments at the end of its snout twitched; it opened its fanged maw and a voice like a striking gong, brassy and ringing and deep enough to make the ground beneath their feet shiver in sympathy, rolled over the graveyard.

It hovered, head cocked as if awaiting an answer.  Xander and Spike stood there dumbstruck.  The creature gave a heavy, disgusted snort, the scent of its breath like burning metal on the breeze, and then it was gone.  Spike jumped back into the shadow of the crypt door as a few small sunbeams penetrated the cypress-shadows.

"What the hell was that?" Xander finally croaked out.

Spike took his cigarette out of his mouth and exhaled a shaky stream of smoke.  "Buggered if I know.  I never did learn Chinese."

         "So?" Willow asked, taking a plate from the dishrack and polishing it with the Hello Kitty dishtowel.  Across the kitchen Tara was wrapping up leftover hamburgers in foil and putting tomato slices and shredded lettuce into Tupperware bowls.

Buffy was concentrating on getting the burnt cheese off the skillet, scrubbing hard with the copper mesh pad.  "A needle pulling thread?"  She was not only in the best mood Willow could remember seeing her in since her return, she was dressed to slay in a dark pleated knee-length skirt and a cream-gold blouse--part of her office drag, Willow knew, but jazzed up with a slim gold belt and matching necklace, displayed to advantage by a few more unbuttoned buttons than most office dress codes would have let her get away with.  How was it, Willow wondered, that Buffy could make the cheapest, tackiest accessories look like a million dollars, while she still gave off an aura of plaid jumpers and goofy hats no matter what she wore?  It was an alien plot, had to be.

“No, doofus.  So, you and Spike.  Things are moving kind of, um, fast, aren’t they?”  Understatement of the year; was it only two days ago that Buffy’d declared the whole thing impossible?

"I guess.  I’ve known Spike way longer than anyone else I’ve slept with."  Buffy applied more elbow grease to the skillet, and for a second Willow was sure she was going to get a polite brush-off.  She slid the plate on top of the stack in the cupboard, watching her friend with worried eyes.  Maybe she was being too pushy.  Once upon a time she wouldn't have had to push at all; Buffy would have been bursting to discuss new developments in her love life with her.  Buffy hadn't shown any interest in girl talk in a month of Sundays, even before her death--she’d completely clammed up about the whole fiasco with Riley, and Willow sometimes suspected that whether she admitted it or not, Buffy was still a tiny bit uncomfortable with the idea of her and Tara and S-E-X.

They’d promised each other no secrets, hadn’t they?  The inner voice she couldn't seem to shut up snipped, Right after the last time Spike nearly tore the whole gang apart.  Not a constructive thought.  Why was she in such a pissy mood today?  She'd gotten that great idea for revamping the transference spell, and she'd gotten the book she needed out of the Magic Box safely.  She stopped herself from throwing an uneasy glance over at her duffle, currently languishing in a corner of the Summers' kitchen.  The book was still there.  There was no reason for anyone to suspect she'd taken it.

“I’m sorry, Buff, if you’re not comfy talking about it--”

"No, it’s OK.  It's just been so long since I had anything to dish about, I've forgotten all the tribal customs."  She stood with one hand resting lightly on the hot water tap, contemplating the drifting archipelagos of soapsuds in the sink with a little smile curving her lips.
        Putting away another plate, Willow asked, "Sparkage, then?"

Buffy toyed with her necklace for a moment, trying hard to suppress the smile and not succeeding very well.  "Maybe," she replied, evasive.  "Oh, who am I kidding, enough sparkage to send the Sunnydale power grid into epileptic fits.  You remember when Riley and I got caught at that party at Lowell House?"

"Hard to forget the great Summers-Finn Boinkfest of '00."

Buffy rolled her eyes and turned the tap on, rinsing out the skillet. "It’s a little like that.  Except, you know, not a magical compulsion, and without the freaky sex-poltergeists draining us.  And it feels about a hundred times better, and a hundred times scarier.  And Spike's a lot more, uh, imaginative than--okay, it’s nothing like that at all.  Last night was so intense--"

Willow's eyebrow went up.  "Is this, like, meeting-with-Angel-that-you-won't-talk-about intense?"

Buffy flicked soapy water at her.  "No.  It was like--imagine the only ice cream you ever had in your life was vanilla.  And it's good.  You like the vanilla.  Yay, vanilla!  But then one day someone hands you a great big ol' butterscotch ripple sundae.  With extra hot fudge and whipped cream and a cherry on top."  She held the skillet up to the light for inspection, then set it on one of the stove burners to air-dry.  "And then tells you that there are seven zillion more flavors still to try, and he owns a Baskin Robbins.”

“And you’re not worried about... all the stuff you were worried about two days ago anymore?”

“I’m terrified.”  The words were a flat statement of fact.  Buffy flipped the damp sponge into the air and caught it.  “But night before last--I could have lost you, or Tara, or Xander, or Dawn.  Or Spike.  Who knows what'll happen tomorrow?  Last time I checked, still a Slayer with a short expiration date, and dead bodies tend to happen in my vicinity.”  For a second her eyes were haunted, though her voice remained flippant.  “Besides, sex changes everything.  Probably the next time we see each other it'll be all weird and uncomfortable and--"

The approaching growl of the motorcycle rattled the panes of the kitchen window slightly, rising to a crescendo and then dying away with a cough as it pulled into the driveway.  Buffy stood on tiptoe and twitched the curtains aside to peer out into the blue-grey dusk.  "It's Spike!" she said, a little breathless, as if she knew hordes of people who were likely to turn up on motorcycles and its being Spike was a wonderful surprise.

"Is he wearing the coat?" Willow asked, straight-faced.

Buffy gave her a suspicious look. "Of course he is.  OK, I'm out of here.  We'll do a standard pass over Rolling Green and Eastside Memorial, and then see if we can rake up any leads on Tanner and his band of Merry Men.  I'll phone at ten-thirty to see if Dawn's home.  I'll probably be home around two."

She pulled the stopper out of the sink and dried her hands, then made a quick detour into the living room to grab a couple of stakes from the weapons chest behind the couch.  Willow followed her, lagging a bit, but getting there in plenty of time to see Tara open the front door in the middle of Spike's over-enthusiastic leaning on the doorbell.  Buffy straightened up, tucking the stakes into her coat pockets.

Spike stood in the doorway, wearing the coat, which had obviously been cleaned up and mended since its encounter with the pyracantha bush.  He looked rather more dressed-up than usual--besides the red overshirt he'd made an attempt to un-scuff the toes of his boots, and he was wearing a couple of those big gaudy silver rings, like the death's-head one he'd given Buffy under the influence of Willow's spell of two years past--Spike's taste in jewelry was an aesthetic train wreck between goth-punk and the Victorian conviction that too much was never enough.  He looked slightly self-conscious until he took in Buffy's attire, and a slow grin spread across his face.  "Dressed for action, I see.  Sorry, Slayer, the bike doesn't come with a side-saddle."

"How cute," Willow whispered to Tara.  "It's a slay date."  Tara poked her in the ribs.

Buffy sashayed over to the door and stood nose-to-chin with him.  She put her hands on her hips and gave him a coolly superior smile in return.  "I used to slay like this all the time.  Just remember, anything you can do I can better--and while wearing high heels."

Spike's arms slid through the crooks of her elbows and round her waist as if drawn by magnets.  "Really?"  He dropped his head a fraction and whispered something in her ear.
 Buffy's cheeks flushed, but there was challenge in her voice.  "Try me.  Come on, Spike, time's wasting."
 He offered her an arm, and after a second's hesitation she took it. Vampire and Slayer strolled arm in arm down the porch steps, laying claim to the night and looking at one another with unabashed hunger in their eyes.
        Beautiful, both of them.  And deadly.  They have power.

There were times, when she was deep in the casting of a spell, when the world fell away and Willow saw everything as patterns and auras of magic.  The spellsight overtook her now, and she saw, not the small lean man and the smaller slim woman, but figures of flame: Spike’s demon-soul dark as midnight, shot through with the gold and scarlet of human desire, Buffy’s human one bright as noon, though the brightness could not conceal the dark currents of power which marked her as something other than merely human.  A crown of crackling blue sparks arced around the shadow-Spike’s head--the chip?

The voice whispered in her mind  Ironic, is it not, that these two whose power was thrust upon them, she unwilling and he unknowing, should outstrip you, who were born to wield it?

Willow blinked and shook her head, hard, and vision returned to normal; it was only Spike and Buffy disappearing round the hedge in the direction of the driveway, Spike starting to tell Buffy about something he and Xander had seen in the cemetery.  “Spike!”  He turned, questioning.  “You be good to her, or--”

He cocked his head to the side, amused.  “You’ll stake me?”

“No.  I’ll tell Xander about your deepest, darkest secret.”  She ran the tip of one index finger up the bridge of her nose.

Spike went a shade paler, if that were possible, and his hand made an abortive movement towards the breast pocket of his shirt.  “You wouldn’t, you vicious little--bloody hell, you would!  What do you lot do, hang about dreaming up ways to torture me?”

Willow smirked at him.  “Like you haven’t done the same to us?”

He considered for a moment, then smirked back.  “It’s a fair cop.”

“What?”  Buffy asked, extending a curious hand towards his pocket.  “What’s in there?”

Spike captured her hand and strode towards the motorcycle.  “Nothing, pet, let’s us just go kill off a few of my friends and relatives, shall we?”  A moment later the motorcycle rumbled to life, and then they were gone, roaring away into the darkness.

“What was that?” Tara asked, slipping an arm around her waist.

"Just a little vampire blackmail,” Willow said with a satisfied smile.  “The punishment should fit the potential crime.  I’ve still got a shovel with Riley’s name on it in my Dad’s toolshed.”  She leaned into her lover's shoulder and sighed.  "Guess that blows the 'next time we meet will be awkward and weird' theory.  I just want it to be all better, now.  I want to know she's happy.  If this whole thing with Spike is just some weird self-flagellation thing because she hates being alive again--"

"I don’t think it is.  But it’s still Buffy’s decision," Tara said firmly.  "You brought her back, but it's Buffy's life, not yours.  Personally," she slipped a hand under Willow's blouse and ran her fingers teasingly along her ribs, "I think your life has enough exciting parts to keep you occupied."

Willow laughed and kissed her on the nose.  "I consider myself chastised."

Tara nuzzled her back.  "We've got the whole evening to ourselves," she whispered, sliding her hand higher.  "I could chastise you a little more."

For a moment Willow wavered.  "I should really work on my English term paper," she said, pulling away.  "I really slacked off my classes after Halloween, and I've got to catch up.  I was going to head over to the university library and see if that new biography of Gertrude Stein was in yet.  I won’t stay out too late.  You want to come along?"

That was a calculated risk.  Dawn wouldn’t be home for hours, but Willow knew that responsible, level-headed Tara would want to be sure that someone was home to answer the phone in case of emergencies.  And just as she’d expected, Tara looked wistful, but shook her head.  "No, I should stay.  I've got homework I can work on here."

Retrieving her duffle from the kitchen corner, Willow slung it over her shoulder, feeling the chill electric tingle of the book inside even through the layers of fabric.  “I’ll be back before you know it,” she promised, and set off into the deepening night.

Part 11

Part 13