He’d stalked her, keeping out of range of both her slayer-enhanced senses and his grand-sires’ familial ties. Watching, gauging. He’d learnt patience for this one; she’d taught him caution, wariness for the unpredictable element that was her bonds to family and friends. He had thought it would be simple, and sent a minion to test her first, that night behind the Bronze. Had been impressed with her skill and flair, the zest she still had for the kill. Unable to wait he’d come after her mere days later, in the halls of her high-school, where he’d had her on the ropes and down for the count. That should have been the end of it but he’d been blindsided literally by the protective instincts of her mother. Bloody bint took a fucking AXE to his head. She had a pair of stones, Slayer’s mum did. He was almost sorry she’d be burying her baby. But for that sacred calling, the sort of dedication she’d had to her progeny should have been rewarded.
 
 Tonight had been glorious. A true meeting of Light versus Dark. He’d met his match, the Batman to his Joker. He’d-had-her-she’d-had-him back and forth, give and take. The best sort of dance. The kind that comes once a century and leaves you feeling a euphoria that tops sex and blood and only happened when you trusted your partner to give their all, when you know only one’ll walk at the end and the only way to win is to have a better day than her. It was always a woman for him, the only ones worth waltzing with. Slayers, the ultimate dance-partner, the sodding Great Challenge. Every time he’d faced one he flirted with the cliff’s edge. It was like sticking a hand in sunlight, only without the immediate burn, and he’d never been sure until the last blow that he’d be the one to walk away.
 
 Spike thought fondly of the warehouse they’d ended up in, the same one he’d made a home for him an’ Dru when they’d first arrived and had to kowtow to the Annoyin’ One. ‘Course, once he’d dusted the pretentious little shit, the Slayer soon found it and that’d been the end of that. He’d moved his black sugarplum to another warehouse, this one even more dilapidated and tumble-down, but it was only a temporary thing, as soon as he found a cure for her wasting illness they were blowin’ this popsicle stand. Too damn many demons gathered about a Hellmouth to make it comfortable as a proper hunting ground, an’ his Dru din’t like to put down roots, no. She was a free spirit in the truest sense of the word, drifting like spidersilk in the wind, to and bloody fro, wherever her whimsy alighted.
 
 He lit a cigarette and inhaled slowly, as he headed back to his beloved Sire's eccentric orbit. He relived the fight in his head, going over and over his favourite parts; the half-choked huff she made when he’d winded her with a perfect boot to the solar plexus. The way her hair seemed to glow like a halo in the light of the full moon when she’d hooked a diminutive fist across his jaw, slamming him head first into a mausoleum wall. Soddin’ hell he’d seen stars for a while after that, bitch could hit like a ton of bricks. The way she hunkered in, fists up and steely-eyed when he bounced on his toes during one of their brief, unspoken truces that seemed to evolve naturally from the titanic effort both put in to ending their opponent.
 
 Even after he’d snapped her wrist, throwing her against the wrought-iron fence of a cemetery, she’d still almost done for him a few times. Spike continued on his way, his eyes half mast and flickering side to side as he reminisced. He’d loved the fact that she had never begged quarter, no matter how many times he knocked her down, even when he’d finally broken her ribs with that vicious heel kick into the iron girder in the warehouse. She just whimpered and squared up again, breathing shallowly, a battered Goddess.
 

---

 
 
The white knight in midnight was returning. Miss Edith had murmured, the pixies confirmed. The sibilant whispers questioning. Where is the White Queen? She could feel the cool fingers of darkness eclipsing the sunshine. Gold to ash. Sunshine and regret. No true night (knight?) this. Too long in the dark and what was white is stained grey.
 
 A gaunt waif whirled through shafts of moonlight, tilting and swaying to unheard music, the flickering black-white of her pale limbs and dark garments juxtaposed. The girl-woman skipped through the shadows and cold silver that made her form appear disjointed, a floating hand, a glimpse of velvet skirt and the flag of her dark tresses. The glitter of eyes from the dark entrance snagged her stilted lone waltz, and she drifted to the centre of the room, sinking artfully to the floor in the largest ray of light. ‘You been dancin’ all the night again, pet?’ A smoky drawl, a hitched unnecessary breath, and a flare of cherry-red in the gloom.
 
 He stalked towards her, loose-limbed and predatory. She felt a frisson of excitement on the side facing his languid approach. Her eyes half-shut she swayed towards him, drawn in by the power, the heat within him. ‘Did my bad dog eat something warm? I smell it you know.' She giggled slyly. 'Bad dog shouldn’t taste sunshine, it’ll burn him to ashes. Open his eyes.’
 
 ‘Pet, you’ll spoil my surprise. ‘ve gotten something for you, a real treat. We’ll have you back to your normal self in no time. See, I had myself a real good day. That pint-sized Slayer won’t be botherin' us anymore, and we’ll be out of Sunnyhell before the next sunrise.’
 
 She moaned, hand to her temple. ‘The stars. They’re screaming at me! Why are they crying so loudly? Where is the White Queen? Shadows. All shadows. White to grey from black. Where is your Queen, little prince?’
 
 *Dru’s been acting right odd since we left Prague* ‘My wicked Queen is right where I left her, dancin’ the night to day and chasin’ moonlight like one o’ her pixies’ He dropped a kiss to her temple and she shivered in reaction, whimpering. He looked at her, frowning a little. She was lost again, blind to the corporeal world. Her sodding Miss Edith had probably made off with her mind again, and she was too thin to wait. He vamped briefly and casually tore his wrist open, tipping it over her parted lips until she latched on and started nuzzling for more of the potent draught. He smiled as almost instantly her features started to fill out and bloom with pale health. He'd already benefitted mightily from the potency of the Slayer's gift, his face was pale and unblemished, cheekbone no longer depressed and his cracked sternum no longer sent jabs of agony through his frame. All the bruising was faded as if weeks and not hours had passed.
 
After a time, he regretfully detached Drusilla from his arm, stroking her hair as he licked his wound closed. Her eyes fluttered slowly, and her pupils sharpened as she came back to herself. A wicked grin flitted across her face and she licked her lips clean, before she suddenly raked him along his cheekbone like an angry cat. 'What's the bad, BAD dog done? He's eaten where he shouldn't hasn't he? Taken too much and burnt the gold to ashes. Tastes of sunshine and regrets he does, and where's his Mummy to find her dearest Daddy when he's gone and hidden the light?' Her face broke and she sobbed and wailed, leaping to her feet and fleeing across the wooden floorboards. 'Daddy is lostlostLOST! Oh what a wicked dog you are little William! Never should have brought you home! Broken home. Lost Daddy. Ashes where the light lives.'
 
He looked on in absolute consternation, hand slowly raised to his cheek. As her words sank in his eyes shuttered, pain driven deep and stomped into a little hole. Dru was havin' an episode. Never means the nasty things she spouts when she goes on like a sack of hammers. Fucking Angelus, couldn't have a toy without that he shattered it and ruined the joy for everyone else. Now he'll have to talk Dru down and hope she forgave him for whatever he had apparently fucked up this time. Only, she was goin' on and on about eatin' wrong, and too much and... Oh hell. What's she seen now? She's been goin on and on about this bloody White Queen and how the sunshine would help her find her Daddy, only the Poofter was in town now, and she'd even been to see him once or twice, by the smell. He tried not to begrudge her, the Sire bond could be a powerful thing, but c'mon, it was the Sodding Forehead. And what did sunlight have to do with him anyway, last he heard just havin a soul shoved up your arse didn't mean a free pass to sunlit strolls on the bloody beach.