Chapter Eleven

Silence engulfed the entire room. Had a pin dropped, it would have been the loudest sound in the room. Apparently, Harris had kept this morsel all for himself. Yes, he was shocked by the self-satisfied look on the Whelp's face, but his brief scan of the room soon told him that none of the rest of the Cleveland gang knew about this either, except for Dana.

"Harris, I'm not some bleeding naïve bloke that can have the wool thrown over my eyes…" he began.

"After Dana was assigned to me, she kept rambling about some blonde vamp and crying out William. At first I still thought she was reliving the visions from the two slayers you had killed." Xander briefly looked guiltily over at Robin. "Sorry man," he said, nodding to Robin.

"S'alright. Spike and I have come to terms about that." Wood said, very coldly.

"Oh that's what you're calling it now. Hmmm." Spike bit back sharply. As far as he was concerned what he'd said after Wood tried to kill him in that bleeding shack of a hundred crosses held true still. He would rip out that bastard's throat if he ever tried anything again.

"Down boys. Let's not get off point, I for one am dying to know all about Xander's story," Faith inserted, tying to cut the visible tension in the room. Spike noted that while everyone from LA appeared visibly upset and ready to spring at the first sign of any action from Wood, the ones who had been back in Sunnyhell - Rona, Faith and Xander - all seemed desperately resolved to putting that sordid chapter behind them. Only Dana and Methos looked confused as to what was the problem.

With a slight nod to Xander, Spike let it go for now. Rogue was right; he wanted to hear what the Whelp thought he'd found out.

Xander began again with one of his most serious expressions. "When I became concerned that Dana was not getting her marbles back, I contacted Andrew. Or rather I should say I flew to Rome, cornered him and threatened to shred his "The Living Daylights" poster, you know how he worships Timothy Dalton. Andy was pretty quick to spill the beans about your resurrection, and what exactly Dana had done in LA. Let me tell you, I was more than a little upset to hear that you were back… thought I would never have to see your mug again. Then to discover that you were willingly working with Angel, well, I thought for sure that even if you were back in black, you weren't the same. No way the Spike we knew would be anywhere near Deadboy much less working with him."

"Yeah well, that's another tale, Ahab." He was itching to hear what Harris had to say, but he didn't want to let the whelp know he was so eager. He needed to appear calm despite every instinct in him fighting to break free and rip that 'I know something you don't' look off the bastard's face. "Harris, before we get on with this fantasy of yours, I don't s'pose it'd be too much to ask for a cuppa would it? I'm feelin' a bit peckish. You seemed to have planned our being here, did you happen across some O-neg for your dear ol' roomie?"

"Even have that disgusting Wheetabix you like to spice it up with, Blood-breath. Rona, would you mind? The Wheetabix is in the top right cabinet, first shelf on the left. Make sure to heat it for 30 seconds," Xander instructed.

Holding his hand over his non-beating heart, Spike played it brash, "I'm touched. Truly. You remembered." Inside, however, Spike couldn't believe that not only had the Whelp remembered how to prepare his blood, but also bought actual Wheetabix to add to it. But he just couldn't show that to Xander.

"Anyway, Andy told me of your connection to that amulet, how first you were sort of all ghostie, and then pop, solid again. So I began trying to find out just what the deal was about that amulet. I know, research, me… but I wasn't doing it for you. Ahn would have wanted me to do this. And as much as it kills me to say this, they need you. Somehow I stumbled across one piece of the puzzle, in one of the Council's old tomes that survived Caleb's bomb fest. Some archives had been buried - well the ones that Travers felt were too dangerous - in a crypt once owned by the Council. This book held the diary of two different Watchers; both were considered renegades in their time. The book is divided between the two; I guess the lack of paper caused the Council to put both together. Anyway the second one had only a short reference to an amulet that would bind the wearer. Apparently this Watcher had come across this some time in the early 1100s or something. There also was a mention of a wolf, a ram, and a hart." Xander paused.

Xander rose from his seat and moved toward a bookcase he'd obviously built. Drawing out a very ancient looking book that smelled weirdly of patchouli and lemon. Spike could tell that Xander held it reverently. Wanker had gone into full librarian mode. He opened the book to a much reviewed page; one that held a drawing of the amulet Buffy had given him on that last night in Sunnydale. The text appeared to be in Latin. Lost in the picture of the amulet in the book, Spike temporarily lost the trail of the conversation.

"Spike," Xander's voice regained his attention. "Do you happen to have the amulet with you? I just want to see if some markings match up according to this book. I want to see if your amulet really is this one. Don't worry I'll give it back. I know how you like to accessorize." Ahab held out his hand as if he fully expected Spike to produce the mystical amulet.

"Sorry whelp, have it safely tucked away for now. For argument's sake, wot does the renegade Watcher tell you in his story?" Rona had returned with a nice mug of blood, handing it to him, she smiled. Spike sipped some of the precious concoction, testing it, and then nodded his thanks as he continued to listen to Xander.

"He writes of how the Wolf, Ram, & Hart stole an amulet from its rightful protectors, somewhere around the time of the Crusades. The recorder of this story used lots of coded words, 'cause remember this was a time of great suspicion and religious hoo-hah. We believe we've translated this word here (pointed to some gibberish) to mean Guardian. And I'm thinking, hey Guardian, wonder if this doesn't mean the Guardians, you know, of Buffy's Scythe. Okay, so anyway, it looks as if maybe Wolfram & Hart used this one battle in the Crusades to mask their true aim - to go after the amulet. So there was some great battle. This recorder had wanted to join forces with the guardians to retrieve this amulet, but was denied by his superiors at the time. They didn't trust either WRH or the Guardians, probably because it was a bunch of women." Xander flipped a page.

"Hold up, there." Spike flinched looking at the next page. On that page where symbols similar to what he remembered Lindsey wearing both as Doyle and when fighting Angel, and also as the symbols he decorated his safe haven with. "These markings… I've seen some of these… what do these mean?"

"I'm not sure. They haven't been deciphered. These are not known in any language database I've been able to uncover. I even surreptiously sent one to Dawn, you know how she was getting so good at ancient languages. But even she was stumped. She suspected the one I sent her was related to ancient Sumerian, but she told me she would only be guessing."

Methos peeked at the markings. Spike noticed his jaw tighten, but the immortal remained tight-lipped. Perhaps he could decipher it, but given his secret, he would only be able to do so later.

"So does this medieval watcher have anything to say about these symbols?"

"He only refers to them as 'power,' 'hide,' 'secret,' and from what I could gather possibly 'invisible'. But he doesn't say much. Whatever these are worked against WRH, but when they learned of them, their mystics countered it."

"Yeah." Spike remembered Angel breaking Lindsey's spell tats and Hambone breaking through to Eve-o-rella's apartment. "So Harris, what else does your diary of a wanker say?"

"I'm getting there, Bloodbreath. It says, well some parts are still not readable, but it says that the wearer of the amulet would be at the mercy of its possessor, and the soul of the wearer would be lost in the great void. That only a great love would protect the wearer from losing his soul. Ironic huh? Buffy does have a way with souls, doesn't she?" he laughed nervously.

"You're wrong." Spike turned on his heel and stormed out of the room.

*****

He stood at his tree, well not his tree, his tree had probably incinerated in the downfall of Sunnyhell. But this one would do. Yes, it would do nicely. Having lit up a cigarette, Spike pulled the toxic chemicals into his dead lungs, blowing out streams of whispery smoke.

The Whelp had it wrong. Wolfram & Hart had intended that Peaches wear that amulet. He was the original vamp with a soul that all the prophecies had been about. Evil Inc. had wanted their new CEO to wear the amulet, so that the tossers could make Angelus again and bring him out for parties. If Angel's soul was lost forever in some great nothingness, he would have to deal with the Supreme wanker again.

It didn't add up. He wore the amulet; when that amulet released him, he was like a ghost, but not, and he still had his soul. Fred had said he wasn't really like a ghost. Something about ecto-whatis was not right. Amulet didn't make him lose his soul. So that medieval watcher was wrong.

Still, if Angel had worn it? The short time he stalked the halls at the ol' Evil lawfirm, he'd learned that they usually know all the loopholes. They had to know that Angel would turn to ashes, like he did. Meaning that they knew whatever spells it took to release him. It didn't make sense otherwise. They had Peaches right where they wanted him, by the shorthairs with Connor and Queen C and in charge of their LA branch. They must have wanted to be able to control when Angel had a soul and when Angelus was let out to play. Some grand scheme for their Apocalypse.

He knew they had access to Soul Retrievers. Hell from what he heard from Red when she got back from her little jaunt to LA complete with bonus gift of Faith in tow, Percy had gotten one to perform the soul-ridding in order to get rid of the Beast.

Nah, that wasn't right. They wanted Angelus, so he could sign away the Shanshu? Was that it? No, cause in order to sign away the Shanshu, he would have to be Angel. Can only sign away what you have, and Angelus meant no soul. The renunciation would be invalid. Hey, he'd learned something from Charlie boy. To paraphrase the Great One, "the soul's the thing."*

Starting to come together a little bit, maybe. If Angelus was in the driver's seat, that took out Angel as a player in the apocalypse. No Angel equals free reign. Angelus wouldn't have cared, unless they intended to screw his own plans. Bastard was funny that way. However, if they 'controlled' him by the amulet… no, Angelus would have wormed his way out of that. He didn't like anyone telling him how to run his unlife. Perhaps an insurance policy? That had to be what those blighters were thinking.

So okay, they had not planned on him wearing the trinket. Buffy screwed their plans. Smirking as he blew out another whirl of smoke - didn't she always? Whether she meant to or not. His girl had a nasty habit of storming in and mucking things up.

A hand on his shoulder caught him by surprise, so lost in his reverie that he hadn't noticed someone else join him out by the tree.

"I know. I hate saying this. All that time I denied it. I refused to see it. I didn't want to see it. Not with you. Not after Deadboy. But I was there after Sunnydale sunk into the pit of hell. I saw how she became. She closed off, she would hide it, but she had shut down her heart. Then I went to Africa, I couldn't see anyone from Sunnydale. I had to make sense of Anya's death. I knew Andy had lied to me. She probably died in some stupid way that wasn't fitting to her at all. But I held onto what Andrew told me. I had to. Just like Buffy had to. Whatever you said to her down there, she held onto it." Xander paused.

Spike couldn't speak. He didn't turn to look at Xander as he moved beside him. He could still see the look on her face as he said; "No you don't, but thanks for saying it." His last words to her. He just wanted her to get to safety. He didn't believe her, but he loved her enough not to let her sacrifice herself in that pit. She had Dawn and her friends and all the new slayers to find. Xander's words scorched his non-beating heart.

Xander had started talking again, "…so yeah I went to Africa. With Dana I saw a way to help. She reminded me so much of Anya. She acts so young, but she's not really that young you know. Hopefully in time, she'll grow out of this stage of dressing like a teenaged anime babe. When I found that book and started learning about the amulet, I had to face some hard truths. I knew that you loved her. I thought it was some sick obsession, but now I know that you really loved her. What was harder to swallow was that for the amulet to act as it did with you, Buffy had to love you too."

"She didn't mate, you're wrong. It's wrong," he whispered, his voice barely a crack.

"No, you idiot, you're wrong. Haven't you learned anything? Didn't you hear what Lucius said in his diary? Okay let me ask you this… you still have your soul, don't you?"

"Yes."

"Well that proves it right there. You would have come back all non-soul-having had her love not protected you, if you had come back at all. I'm still not clear why you came back all less than solid, and how Lindsey, was that his name, played a role in all this. It's possible that this Lindsey had learned some things during his time at Wolfram & Hart. I overheard Gunn just a bit ago tell Rona about Wesley's books being able to call up texts long destroyed or forgotten and translating them on site. Man that would be neat. And maybe he took those secrets with him. Somehow that amulet arrived at Angel's feet and you emerged from the locket. I hear you were tied to that place while you were ghostie. That tracks with the control part of the amulet. It was the property of Evil Inc. at the time. How he was able to give you your body back, I'm stumped."

"That makes two of us."

"But you missed the best part. And man, you and Buffy like to storm off, don't you?"

"What?"

"Well just the part that finally nailed the coffin of my denial about you two."

"Spit it out, whelp." Spike finally turned to look Xander in the eye.

With a stupid grin on his face, Harris said, "Ever hear of a little thing called destiny? On the next few pages in the diary, Lucius tells of a 'slayer' who goes against her calling and loves a 'champion of the night' and together they… well do you want to know the rest?"

"That could have been about the Slayer and Peaches."

"No…no…no, you're just not getting this are you? I know it took me a while to come to terms with it. But even I accept it now. I don't have to like it, but I accept it. The rest of it gives some weird details that only fit you and Buffy. It was meant for you. Except…"

Hope had started to rear its ugly head in his heart. Sure she was technically his mate, hell technically she had claimed him too, but that didn't mean she loved him. Had the Powers-that-like-to-fuck-you really wanted them together all along? "Except what?"

"Except that it says something about a mating ritual, something about blood. I say something because whatever it was had to have been so shocking that even Lucius tried to obliterate it. But I think it means that you guys have to be married or something."

Spike couldn't believe his ears. But he had to ask, "Wot happens if Buffy and I do this ritual?"

"Oh now you're interested. She becomes I think either immortal or invincible, couldn't really make out the word, and you are to be her greatest protector. Each stronger because of the other. Oh, and some great battle with evil… but, as G-man always says, there's always a battle with evil in these things."

Breaking into a huge smile, Spike clapped Xander on his shoulder. "Ahab, you and your slayer just bought yourselves a ticket to Rome."
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* A/N: The Great One of which Spike refers is William Shakespeare. The actual full quote is "The play's the thing. Wherein I'll catch the conscience of the King."- Hamlet (II, ii, 633).

~~~tbc~~~