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The Demon in Me by Spikeschilde
 
Chapter 11 - 15
 
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Chapter Eleven


Joyce heaved a sigh of relief as she awoke. It was Saturday morning and none of her surrogate children had to be at school, Janice was running the gallery, and it was in the a.m. hours which therefore held no threat of vampire attacks.

She had no idea how Buffy had managed for the last two years. A little over a week and she could feel the fatigue pulling at her body from lack of sleep and the stress she held from keeping everything together. Maybe it was time to look into setting up a web server so she could work from home.

As much as her daughter protested about the idea when she had raised it a few nights ago, Joyce was going to have to look into home schooling. Being able to run the gallery from home could have its advantages. Plus it would expand her networks and bring in a pull of new artists.

Joyce rolled over in bed, making a mental check list of things she had to do as she checked the clock on her nightstand: 6:30 a.m. The house was quiet as its occupants slept on. The only one awake at this hour would be her daughter, dutifully keeping watch downstairs while her friends slept.

She knew there was more to it than that though. On her way down to get herself something to drink one night, she had stopped on the stairs to listen to her daughter’s muffled sobs coming from the living room. Joyce was about to go downstairs to console Buffy, but the minute she made a noise on the staircase, the crying had stopped. So, Joyce had let her be and silently made her way back up the stairs without her drink.

Now Buffy had a pet vampire to keep her company, though he had confined himself to the basement most of the time, to keep away from all their human-like behaviour. Joyce chuckled to herself at the thought of Spike; he really was charming in his own way, such a mixture of sensitivity, insecurity and the need to live up to his ‘big bad’ reputation.

She could see the man he held buried beneath his hardened exterior, and she supposed it was the reason he felt the need to lash out at all things human so much. He could still see a bit of William in himself and he didn’t like it. No, that wasn’t right, he didn’t want to like it—he didn’t want to want it to be part of him because it made him ‘weak’ in the eyes of his demon brethren.

Joyce giggled to herself. She was spending way too much time in the company of Giles.


***



Despite her lack of aversion to the sun, Buffy felt the soft hands of sleep calling her as the dawn broke outside. It had become almost like an automatic trigger inside her brain—dawn meant sunlight, sunlight meant no Angelus and no Angelus meant she could drop her guard long enough to get some sleep, even if it was only for an hour or two.

Buffy’s body had been running on adrenaline for the first few days, then on the acute need to know that she was doing everything possible to keep the threat of Angelus away from the ones she loved. As the days wore on and Angelus still hadn’t made a move to attack, she began to feel the effects the lack of sleep was having on her body.

She hadn’t eaten properly in days, neither blood nor the normal human food which her body still held the need for. But even the need to eat took backseat precedence over her body’s need for sleep.

As soon as dawn rolled around her body switched off, almost instantly falling into the deep sleep it craved.

That was how Joyce found her when she made her way down stairs. Joyce had stopped for a moment in the doorway—only slightly perturbed by her daughter’s complete and utter lack of movement, even the soft rise and fall of her chest. The memory of Giles telling that Buffy was virtually indestructible was enough to ease her discontent and her motherly instincts immediately kicked in.

Grabbing the comforter of the back of the couch Giles was sleeping on, Joyce walked over and covered her baby up. Perhaps Willow might be able to help her set up a website later today, she would even pay the redhead a small monthly wage to keep the site running and updated.

Having come to a decision, Joyce made her way into the kitchen to prepare a large breakfast for everyone. While she was in there she heated a mug of blood for her vampire house guest and left it on the top step of the basement stairs for him to collect when he was hungry. They had had a week to panic. Now it was time to pull together. They would accomplish nothing if they weren’t well rested and fed and it was time someone took those matters into hand.


***



‘Run. Don’t stop moving. Just keep going—ignore the pain.’

Her heavy foot falls pounded on the pavement, her breathing and heart beat erratic. Her lungs and legs muscles burned from exhaustion, and each fall of her foot seemed to come heavier than the last.

The long narrow pathway curled its way out before her, around hills and corners so that it was sometimes out of sight.

‘Don’t move off the path—don’t let it catch up to you.’

She rounded the bend and hesitated for a moment as the road split into to separate pathways.

‘Don’t stop moving.’

She gasped for breath and shot a look over her shoulder fleetingly before taking off down the path that curled to the left. The ground shuddered beneath her feet for a moment before becoming calm again. She lowered her head and picked up her pace.

“Excuse me?” Her head shot up at the sound of someone calling her. Her eyes scanned the area and came to rest on a man standing by the edge of the road dressed in a suit, white gloves, and a white mask that covered his eyes. “Miss Summers?”

Against her will her legs stopped running. “Yes?”

“You have to come with me. We’re here to help you.” Buffy’s eyebrows furrowed in confusion.

“Help me?” The man before her held out his gloved hand.

“Yes, quickly now, come this way!” Warily she grasped the hand and immediately he began to pull her off the path and towards a clump of bushes.

‘Don’t move off the path.’

Panic gripped her and she dug her heels in trying to pull her hand from the man’s. He looked back at her and seemed to sense what had her panicking.

“Don’t worry, where here to help you. You’ll be safe with us, Miss Summers.” Buffy cast a nervous glance over her shoulder as the ground began to tremor gently again.

“No, let me go. I have to keep running!” His iron grip held tight.

“But you’ve been running for so long, aren’t you tired?”

“No!” She yelled as she wrenched her arm out of his and took off for the path at a sprint, even as the ground quaked beneath her. Panting heavily for air she threw herself back onto the winding track heedless of the shouts of ‘Miss Summers’ coming from behind her.

She could see a black clad figure in the distance. He was just standing patiently by the edge of the path, looking down the road towards her. As she got closer she could see it was Spike and he was waving to her as she drew near.

“Slayer—”

“Not now, Spike! We have to run!” She said as she pushed at him to run with her. The tremors in the ground had died down, but every second she stood still would make them closer to coming back.

“I know, kitten.” Buffy’s gaze shot to his.

“You know?” He nodded and took her into his arms. She looked up at him quizzically as he gently held her to him. “Spike, there’s something after me, I have to keep running.”

He smiled softly down at her. “The cake’s already baked. We just don’t know what the flavour is yet.”

“What? You’re not making sense,” she said as she turned her head to look back over her shoulder. She could already feel the light vibrations running up her legs.

“Sometimes you have to look beneath the mask that’s presented.” Her brows furrowed as she looked back up at him.

“Do you mean the men in the white masks? They were trying to help me?” He didn’t answer her. He just took as step back and held out his hand.

Buffy gasped as the image of Spike shifted and he became a man with honey blonde hair who wore glasses and was dressed in a suit. She realised as she stared at him in shock that this was William.

“Watch out!” She yelled as one of the white masked men came up behind him.

“You have to see past the mask, Buffy.” Buffy’s gazed bounced back to William before turning back on the man. She stared hard at him, willing herself to see behind the mask.

Slowly the image dissolved as she was staring a lightly balding older man. Another one walked up behind him, devoid of both mask and gloves. He held a cup of tea in his one hand and a rotting olive branch in the other.

“The council.” William nodded eagerly.

“Are you entirely sure what your meant to be running from?” She looked back at William, whose image seemed to have mixed with Spike’s. As the ground beneath began to quake again she grabbed his hand.

The smile he gave her was blinding and he pulled her into him as the world around them dissolved until she found herself standing next to Spike in a bedroom.

It was beautiful. The bed was covered with white silk sheets and sprinkled with red rose petals. Lamps were scattered about and had been draped with scarves to give the room a soft warm glow, and the French windows rested open so a soft breeze was blowing the sheer curtains into the room.

Buffy turned to him with a smile. “Did you do all this?”

Spike smirked at her. “This? No, that was all William.”

“It’s beautiful,” she said, returning her gaze to their setting.

“I’m glad you like it. I wanted to do this properly,” he said as he reached over and took her hand again.

Buffy arched an enquiring eyebrow at him. “Do what exactly?”

“Angelus still holds his claim over me, pet. I need you to break it.” She gave him a confused look.

“But I won the fight. I thought that meant that I had claim over you now.”

Spike smiled at her gently. “No, you still have to bite me. There’s a ritual of sorts.” Buffy’s confused look became one of worry.

“Is it very complex?” Spike chuckled deeply.

“No, kitten, you’ll be just fine. Don’t think, just feel. Once you’ve claimed me everything will stop being affected by your demon and I’ll belong to you.” Spike took her hand again and led her over to the bed. She put up no resistance as he lay her down gently.

“Does Giles have to take notes? I’d prefer it if we were alone.” Spike looked over his shoulder at the Watcher who was seated upright in a chair in the very corner of the room.

“He doesn’t know what’s happening yet. Needs to take notes so he can research.”

“Why can’t we just tell him?”

“’Cause you’re not awake.” His lips lowered until they were hovering an inch away from hers. He trailed a line of kisses and small nips along her jaw line and up to her ear. “Wake up, Buffy,” he whispered softly right before he lunged for her neck.


***



Buffy’s eyes flew open as her hand instantly flew to her neck where Spike had bitten her just as she had woken. She had just had a dream—a prophetic dream—and the last time she had dreamt like that she had been killed by the Master.

Her mind instantly wandered back over the messages contained within the dream. There were men in white masks, pretending to help her, but really leading her off the right path. The council was going to have some part in all this mess, and she couldn’t trust them.

“Ow!” Buffy frowned and looked over the edge of the couch to find Cordelia splayed out on the floor, her hand clutching her forehead.

“Cordy? What are you doing on the floor?” The brunette shot her a withering glare.

“Oh don’t play cute with me, ‘what are you doing on the floor?’” Cordy mocked in a put on voice as she got herself up. “See if I ever try and wake you up again. I am, like, so going to have the biggest bruise on my forehead now, because I’m-Miss-Buffy-the-Vampire-Slayer decides to head butt the person who is nice enough to try and wake her up!” Buffy frowned as Cordy walked out of the room still complaining loudly.

Giles. She needed to find her Watcher. And a vampire—if the dream was anything to go by she had to claim him fast, before Angelus recovered and tried to use its pull against them.




Chapter 12


Buffy stood at the top of the stairs which led to the basement and took a deep breath. She knew that the vampire within was asleep because he had yet to acknowledge her presence, so she took the time she had to prepare herself for what she was about to do.

There was a small pit of doubt within her that was screaming to run away and fast—that she was crazy to bind herself to Spike. Bits and pieces of the argument she just had with her Watcher playing on repeat in her head.


“Buffy, I can understand your distress, but this is completely mad! You’ll be bound to him forever! Forever! Do you understand how long that is? A life time will come and go and we will all pass on, but you will still be alive and you will still be bound to him!”

“Angelus’ claim has to be broken. He knows that Spike is working with us. It a weakness we can’t afford.”

“Do you even realise what a claim entails? Have you even thought about the ramifications that may be involved? How do we know that once you have claimed him HE won’t try and use it to control YOU?”

“That’s why I need your help. Please, Giles.”


Her argument had been convincing, yet she couldn’t remember a word of it now that the time had come to act upon her well-researched plan.

“There’s nothing to be nervous about. You’ll hold the power in the claim. If anything, it will reinforce his loyalty in this mess. You can do it,” Buffy whispered to herself quietly as she lowered her weight onto the first step of the staircase. It squeaked loudly and she froze in place, her wide eyes darting to the bed to see if Spike had woken. “He’s still asleep. You can do this.”

She kept repeating the mantra over and over in her head as she descended the rest of the staircase silently and made her way towards the bed.


***



Dru whimpered and moaned as her ‘daddy’ ploughed roughly into her from behind. Usually she enjoyed it when he was rough with her. Usually she enjoyed it when he did anything to her, as long as he was paying her attention—letting her know he cared, even a little bit.

But tonight something in the air was wrong. Something was brewing, and try as she might she couldn’t expel it from the extremities of her mind. She knew it was beginning to irritate her Angel that she wasn’t screaming and sobbing like she normally did, but for once her broken mind couldn’t—wouldn’t—focus on her daddy.

Dru could hear her dollies whispering together from across the room, conspiring together and leaving her out. They were still upset with her and every time she tried to listen to what they were saying they fell silent and refused to talk again until she had moved away.

She let out a deep moan of pleasured pain as Angelus gripped her hair harshly and pulled her head back baring her throat to him. His thrust became harder as his fangs ripped into her neck, not drinking, nor claiming, merely puncturing for the joy that her pain brought him.

Angelus let the wound weep as he pulled back again and watched the rivulets of blood stream down the back of her neck, past her shoulder blades and into the slight indentation made by her spine as it continued down to pool in the small of her back before his powerful thrusts scattered the liquid making it stream down around her sides and drip onto the bed.

Dru whimpered and tried to find pleasure in the act but she couldn’t. Something was about to go terribly wrong, and try as she might she couldn’t switch her mind off.


***



Spike awoke as Buffy neared the bed. Opening one eye he watched her quizzically, trying to discern why she practically had a flashing neon sign posted above her head reading ‘nervous’.

“You alright, pet?” Buffy shuddered at his voice which was still husky from sleep. Licking her lips nervously, she walked towards him and helped him into a sitting position on the miniature cot, so that his back was resting against the wall.

He arched a scarred eyebrow at her as she moved so that she was straddling his legs. He went along with it as she placed one hand on his shoulder and the other at the nape of his neck.

“Feeling a bit peckish, Slayer?” Buffy ignored his question, positive that if she opened her mouth to speak her voice would come out wavering. Instead she focused her attention on finding Angelus’ mark on Spike’s neck.

Spike frowned as he felt her sniffing softly at his neck. What exactly was she doing? An involuntary growl was torn from his lips as she found and swiped her tongue over his grandsire’s mark of domination. She was going to claim him.

Knowing that the bite would be painful and less effective if he didn’t submit, he tilted his head in supplication. Buffy brought her demon to the fore, instantly demanding the presence of Spike’s demon which emerged without a fight.

“Do you know what your doing, pet?” Spike asked as he brought his hands to rest on her hips.

“I think so,” she whispered back nervously.

“You think so?” He asked as his eyebrows shot up.

“I had Giles research it with me,” she said in a soft voice which was muffled against his neck.

“Bloody hell!” Spike let his head fall back against the wall. That would have gone over well with the Watcher. Spending what was left of the afternoon researching books on vampire claims with his Slayer, so that said Slayer could claim William the Bloody thereafter. “Are you sure you read up on the right one? There’s more than one type of claim, you know.”

“Domination?” She asked in the same small voice. “Is that the one I want?” Spike didn’t answer her verbally, but she felt the nod of his head.

God, the last thing he wanted was to be branded with a bite of domination—less so with the slayer as its owner. But he knew that it was the only way to break Angelus’ claim over him. It was either that or mate with the chit. Mating claims made void all other claims over a vampire, but with that there really was no going back, and he wasn’t sure that forever was what he was looking for with the Slayer. At least in those terms—after the domination was completed he would be linked to her forever anyway.

“Bite deep, love. Got to make sure it will scar.” He was surprised when she didn’t go for the bite right away. Instead she employed the tactic he had used on her the night before. Ghosting kisses up and down the column of his neck before her tongue flicked out to swipe at the mark.

His eyes fell closed and his head fell back against the wall as she ground her hips down into his. She had read that bites of domination were often painful, and while vampires usually enjoyed pain, most often employed some method of distraction to keep their mind off of it. So she was going with the only way she knew how—the same way he had distracted her from his bite.

Spike’s grip on Buffy’s hips grew tighter as he helped her control her movements until she had settled into some sort of pattern. His jaw was clenched and his nostrils were flared as he breathed in the heady scent of her arousal as it began to fill the air surrounding them. He groaned at her whisper soft pants and whimpers in his ear; they were making him harder by the second and he could feel the bite of his zipper against the head of his shaft.

He felt her tongue find Angelus’ mark on his neck again and tensed slightly just as she drove her Slayer fangs into his neck. He let out a hoarse cry and bucked his hips up into hers as she ground hers down to keep him from throwing her off of him and the bed. Spike released a sound that seemed stuck between a whimper of pain and pleasure as Buffy kept up her stimulation of the growing bulge in his pants.

Buffy could feel his hand sliding up her back and holding her head in to his neck as he encouraged her to bite deeper. She groaned loudly as his bloody flowed freely down her throat in rivers, before finally shaking her head to tear the holes slightly. She then pulled back from him and swiped her tongue over her mark to close the wounds.

“Blood consumed and being marked, you are mine to have and to own.”


***



Drusilla let out a wail as the familial claim over Spike was ripped from her being and his presence completely lost to her in a void of darkness. She used all her strength to throw her sire off her before she stumbled from the bed to collapse on the floor.

“William! My William!” She sobbed and tore at her hair trying to find some way through her frantic panic to bring the connection back. It had been there for what seemed like forever, her safety net to go to whenever her daddy wasn’t around. Now there was nothing but an empty darkness where her prince had once been.

Her head shot up so that she was staring at the doll on the mantle piece as a cackling laughter reached her ears. “You! You did this! You and that nasty sunshine! Bring him back!” She screamed at the doll, “BRING HIM BACK!”

Her ear piercing screech reverberated throughout the room for a few seconds, then everything fell silent and not even the pixies would speak to her.




Chapter 13


Spike felt the Watcher’s eyes zero in on his neck the instant that he and the Slayer exited the basement, and had to suppress the urge to growl at the frustrated and disapproving look he gave them. It was obvious—if it hadn’t already been before—that the Buffy’s Watcher did not hold the same sentiments concerning this claiming.

Trying to ease some of the tension that was passing back and forth between Slayer and Watcher, Spike stepped away from her side and went to sit beside the werewolf. He liked this kid; his demon seemed to have a calming effect on his own, and he didn’t feel the need to yammer on about everything and anything he could thing of.

Everyone was assembled in the kitchen, sitting on various counter tops, and seemed to be waiting for them so they could start some type of Scooby meeting. He ignored the way the whelp’s eyes bore into his back as he crossed the room to hoist himself up onto the counter top beside the werewolf.

“I see the bleached wonder can walk again,” Xander sneered, turning his head away from the blond menace and completely missing the extra set of holes in his neck. “With Slayer blood pumping—or not pumping—away in his veins, it would make him pretty invincible at the moment, right? I don’t see why we can’t just send him back to the mansion to deal with the evil twins.”

Spike felt the growl rise in his throat at the implied comment he could hear in the boy’s voice suggesting that he was no longer evil. He’d be damned if he got stuck doing their dirty work, and he had never consented to killing Dru. Just because he was helping them defeat Angelus and had allowed himself to be dominated by the Slayer didn’t mean he was willing to don a white hat and jump on their say so. As soon as this fiasco was over, her was grabbing his dark princess and getting the hell out of dodge.

“I’m not doing your Slayer’s bloody dirty work for you, whelp,” Spike replied, sending Xander a glare at which the brunette rolled his eyes. Spike cringed internally—being in the presence of these people did wonders for your evil self-esteem.

“Please, like you have any say in the matter any more. You are totally Buffy’s butt monkey,” Xander retorted, sporting a grin which was just a bit too smug for Spike’s liking. He released a little snarl from his chest as he turned cold eyes on the Slayer.

“S’that what you’ve been telling everyone, pet?” His tone was steely and he smiled to himself as the Slayer instantly began back peddling.

“No! I swear! The only person I told was Giles.” Steel blue eyes turned to a guilty looking Watcher.

“Well then, seems the Watcher might have misinformed you as to what my ‘butt-monkey’ status actually entails. It doesn’t take away my free will, whelp, so I’d watch your mouth. Not always going to have your Slayer bodyguard to protect you.” Giles cleared his throat, trying to diffuse the growing argument.

“Yes, well, I’m afraid we missed out window of opportunity, Xander. Angelus will be expecting us now, whether we plan to attack or not. We’ve also lost the element of surprise we had with Buffy’s unknown status,” he stated as he took his glasses off and pinched the bridge of his nose.

“To be fair, it wasn’t much of an advantage. As soon as I went all demony, he went all growly and tried to jump me,” Buffy said matter-of-factly in her defence. Giles barely resisted the urge to roll his eyes heavenward.

“I do so love how you butcher the English language,” he muttered as he replaced his glasses. Spike snorted in agreement.

“What about Buffy’s dream? Was there anything else useful in that?” Willow asked as she peeked out from behind her computer.

“Dream?” Joyce queried, placing her mug of coffee down and looking quizzically at her daughter.

“Part of the Slayer package, mom. I get prophetic dreams occasionally.” Her mother made an impressed sound.

“Did you happen to see us coming into a load of cash?” She muttered to herself as she took another sip from her rapidly cooling drink.

“Buffy?” Giles prompted, pulling the teen’s attention back onto the dream.

“Yeah? Oh right, the dream. I told you about it right? The only warning it appeared to be giving me was to be wary of the Council. Very heavy ‘not what they seem’ undertones. The rotting olive branch, white masks, and the fact that they kept trying to lead me off the path that I had to follow—which is really kind of symbolic now that I think of it.” Giles frowned and shook his head lightly in confusion.

“Are you sure it was prophetic? I just don’t see why you would be sent dreams to warn you about the people for whom you work. The Council has been on the side of good for as long as it has been established. Even longer, one could assume. What else was in the dream?” Buffy blushed as she remembered the bedroom Spike had taken her to. Some how she knew if she brought that up she wouldn’t be taken seriously.

“Nothing else,” she confirmed.

“Are you sure?” Buffy couldn’t look Giles in the eye, so she settled for nodding her head vigorously and trying to hide the blush that was staining her cheeks.

“I just don’t see what you have to be wary of from the Council,” Giles said adamantly.

“Please Watcher, you can’t honestly tell me you believe the council to be one hundred percent on the up and up. An organisation like that is bound to have corruption within its ranks. Just depends on how far up on the hierarchy the corruption is as to how bad it will be for you.” Giles looked torn between his sense of loyalty and what he knew deep down to be true.

“What cause would they have to attack their own Slayer?” Giles put up feebly. Truth was, he could think of dozens of reasons. He had heard stories—whispered back and forth between students in his days when he was training to be a Watcher—of the council killing off their Slayers when they became old enough to question whether what they were doing was right.

He hadn’t thought anything of it back then, at a time when he knew no vampires personally and had only ever seen their true face in the books he studied within the Council headquarters. But now, after meeting the vampire with a soul on the road to redemption and the vampire without one who was willing to side with the Slayer to work towards a common goal, he was being forced to look further into the pockets of grey he had found in a black and white world.

“I would have thought your Slayer’s new and improved self would have been reason enough,” Spike retorted, giving Giles a condescending look.

Giles sighed heavily and rubbed a hand over his tired face in irritation. He knew he was being irrational, but he still felt that as a Watcher he should at least put up a token protest in the Council’s defence. “We should look into better surveillance. I dare say they will spend sometime watching you before they decide to make any move.”

“Wait, so now I not only have my deranged ex-boyfriend after me, but the Council is trying to kill me as well? Why don’t I just jump off of a cliff and save them the effort?” Spike chuckled loudly and Buffy shrank back slightly under her mother’s icy glare.

“There will be no jumping off of any cliffs. Let’s just think this through,” Joyce said, straightening up. “If they are having someone watch the house, then maybe we should think about dropping the cloaking spell. Angelus knows where you are and they will know something is up with us the second the realise that all the lights are on in the home but they haven’t seen a single person inside.”

Giles coughed slightly in surprise at her logic on the matter. “Yes, well, there is no use in us continuing to hide our presence if he already knows where we are.”

“Yeah, I’d say he has a pretty darn good idea.” Willow’s voice spoke up from the table again. There was a slight tremor in her voice that had everyone looking at her. She gestured towards the window with wide eyes as they turned to find the face of the vampire in question watching them. Both Cordelia and Xander sprung back from the window simultaneously emitting identical shrieks.

The cloaking spell prevented Angelus from actually seeing or hearing anything they did, but he seemed to realise suddenly that he had their attention as a slowly evil smirk formed on his face and he lifted a hand to wave mockingly at them.

“You’ve got to come out some time,” he said, speaking loudly enough for them to hear through the glass, before melting back into the darkness of the night. Buffy’s eyes never left the spot where he had been.

“We have to do something. I’m sick of waiting around.”




Chapter 14


James was roused from his sleep by the sound of branches snapping under the weight of someone’s feet. He bolted up immediately—his hand instinctively going for the tranquiliser gun that lay beside him. As he peered out cautiously into the night, the house, and everything around it, was as void of life as it had been since his arrival in Sunnydale—excepting the brief stint where he had seen the girl flee from the house.

If it would not lead to the fact that his superiors would inevitably find out that he had fallen asleep on the job on more than one occasion, James would have packed up his gear and changed posts by now. He didn’t even know for sure if the girl had returned home.

Dropping his guard again, James relaxed back against a tree—there was no one there.

He jolted violently and a loud shriek of pure terror was torn from his lips when he was unexpectedly grabbed from behind and hefted into the air with ease.

“Now, what do we have here? What dresses in tweed, lurks outside the Slayer’s place and is dumb enough to carry a tranquiliser gun but not a stake in Sunnydale?” James let out an unmanly whimper as he struggled to free himself from the iron grasp as his heart rate almost tripled in speed “I’m guessing that you, my friend, work for the Council. Am I right?”

Throwing caution, protocol and everything but his sheer need for survival into the wind, James nodded frantically as his arms flailed about, trying to find purchase on something—anything—to help support his weight.

“Hmm, and why do you happen to be lurking around dear old Buff’s home?” Once again, James thought of nothing but his immediate sense for survival from what he was now more than certain was a vampire that had him clutched around the back of the neck as he dangled him a foot above the ground.

“P-prophecy…I was sent to w-watch the Slayer.” It took a moment for James to register that he had been dropped. As soon as he came to his senses though, he was scrambling around to face his attacker as he threw his spare arm out to reach for the tranquiliser gun.

“Ah, ah, ah!” Angelus teased, seeing what James was after and planting a heavy foot into the man’s chest, forcing him back so he was sprawled out on the ground before him. A thrill of pleasure and satisfaction raced through Angelus as he watched all colour and anything but pure unadulterated terror bleed from the man’s features as his bladder let go simultaneously in reaction to seeing Angelus in game face.

James felt the effects of horror wash through him, paralysing him with fear as he realised he was looking into the face of a vampire for the first time and not just the pictures the council had been showing him in books for years. This was the real thing. That he could recognise this creature as Angelus “The Scourge of Europe” offered him no comfort. All sense of pride at correctly identifying who the vampire was fled as the muscles holding his bladder released and he wet himself.

“Prophecy? What do you know about it?” James started to shake his head but stopped quickly as a booted foot pressed down harder on his chest.

“I don’t know anything! I swear!” James sobbed, unashamed of the fat tears rolling down his face

Angelus paused to consider him for a moment. “I guess we’ll find out, won’t we?”

A harsh kick to the head had the human slumping unconscious before Angelus picked him up, slung him over his shoulder, and walked off into the night.


***



“I can still hear you. Still talking, still singing, telling me I’ve been a bad girl. I’ve done everything you asked of me, why must you keep screaming?”

Drusilla stared at the doll that was mocking her from her place on the mantel piece. When had Miss Edith decided to stop talking to her? All she did now was mock her and laugh and scorn her for what she did to the sunshine. It was daddy’s fault—ever since he had come home Miss Edith had been unusually quiet. It was his fault that she was mocking Dru, his fault that they had made that little ball of sunshine and his fault that it took her William away.

“Stop it! Stop laughing at me!” Dru threatened as she rose to her feet. The doll only seemed to laugh harder. “I shall poke out your eyes!”

Letting out a small growl of anger, the vampiress flew across the room with all the inhuman grace of the predator she was as snatched up the doll. She marched back over to the bed with the doll before lifting up one of the pillows and jamming Miss Edith under it, trying to smother out the sound.

She let out a whimper of frustration as the taunting could still be heard and instead attempted to push the doll under the bed.

“Please, stop!” Dru tried the trunk at the end of the bed, the bottom drawer of the dresser in the room, and the closet buried under a pile of clothes until the frustration of it finally hit her and she picked the doll up and swung.

Bits of porcelain shattered and flew across the room as she smashed the doll’s head against the wall finally bringing the whispers to an end. Miss Edith was dropped from her hands as Dru backed away from the broken doll timidly.

‘Dru?’ Drusilla’s head whipped around to stare at the doll on the mantel piece as she heard the whisper. Miss Sally was smiling at her with her big hazel eyes free of the contempt Miss Edith’s had held.

“Miss Sally?” She felt the smile and mental nod the doll projected to her.

‘Find him, Drusilla darling. Go find our William and bring him home. Promise him what he has long desired and he will be ours again.’ A small smile broke the strained features of Drusilla’s face.

“Yes, I’ll bring our Willy back to mummy.”


***



Dru could feel the pulse of magic from the cloaking spell as she approached the Slayer’s house. It was strong and it pushed heavily on the fringes of her mind, but Dru knew her Spike was inside. Miss Sally had told her that she would find her boy there and she had listened knowing what was revealed to be true.

Dru walked until she could fell the vibrations of the magic against her skin before holding a hand up in front of her as thought it were resting atop of the invisible barrier of the spell. Closing her eyes, Dru began to hum softly, channelling her mind to see past the spell. She gave a small growl as she felt the spell give way against the probing of her mind like the popping of a balloon allowing her to see once more inside the house.

Her William was sitting in the kitchen with the Slayer, drinking out of a mug and smirking at the small blonde. Her eyes were transfixed on the new set of scars on her boy’s neck. They seemed to call to her—burning her in a more painful way than she could have ever imagined.

It was all the Slayer’s fault. The nasty girl had ruined her happy home first by stealing her daddy’s attention then by stealing her prince. Everything that had gone wrong was her fault, had she not been turned then Miss Edith would still be talking to her and everything would be as it should. Why? Why had her daddy turned the sunshine into the moon?

Closing her eyes, Dru focused on the thought of her childe. When she could feel the slight tingling of his presence on the back of her neck, she sent out a call to him as his sire—the only link remaining between them. If there was one way she knew was sure to get Angelus’ attention, it was to pay attention to Spike. She needed her boy back home—her safety net.


***



Inside, Spike’s back went rigid as he felt the call of his sire. He turned slowly and peered out the window of the back door and into the night.

“What is it?” Buffy asked, not having sensed anything out of the ordinary. It was the only drawback of the spell; while it completely cloaked their presences from those outside, it also masked the presence of anyone outside of its barriers until they were almost flush against the side of the house.

“Drusilla,” Spike said absently as he got up from his seat and made his way to the back door. “She’s calling me.”

Buffy got up quickly and joined Spike by the back door. Drusilla was calling him. Did that mean he would leave? That he would call the whole truce off and run off with his beloved sire again? After all, she was the reason he wanted to kill Angelus.

Buffy tried unsuccessfully to stifle the wave of jealousy within which came roaring to the forefront. Spike was hers now, what right did that bitch have to come and try to take him away again? She had treated him like shit despite the way he had cared for her and loved her for the past century. She didn’t deserve him.

Buffy refused to listen to the little niggling voice in the back of her head that questioned why she was getting so worked up over the thought of Spike leaving. He was hers, simple as that.

Drusilla smiled brilliantly at him as the door was opened. “Spike.”

“Dru,” Spike answered in a guarded voice “What are you doing here?”

“Mummy has come to bring her boy home. You’ve been bad, playing with the nasty Slayer and leaving poor princess all by herself.” Buffy gritted her teeth, practically turning green with jealousy as Dru fluttered her eyelashes at Spike and sent him coy looks. How dare she!

“Not by yourself. You had Angelus, pet. You never paid any attention to me, and I’m surprised you even noticed I was gone.” Spike wasn’t stupid. The only reason she was here was because Angelus wasn’t paying her enough attention. Wasn’t that how it always went? Peaches started to lose interest, so Dru used Spike in an effort to make her sire notice again, and once she had her daddy’s attention, she forgot about Spike to jump back into her sire’s bed. Spike snorted internally.

Sad part was that usually Spike would soak up the attention despite knowing that she was using him. ‘I loved her. It didn’t matter that she wasn’t mine most of the time, the titbits I got were enough,’ Spike thought sarcastically in a self deprecating tone. No wonder Angelus made such fun of him—for the majority of it he had been a wanker where Dru was concerned.

“The sunshine ripped you from me, and Miss Edith refused to play without the presence of our boy. My sweet William, how it must have hurt to be torn from your family so? Mummy’s come to make it better.” Spike frowned. He felt no desire what-so-ever to take his sire up on what she was so clearly offering. He shot a small glance over his shoulder at the small blonde just behind him—nope, definitely no desire to leave with his sire.

Dru could tell she was getting nowhere; her William was blinded by the sunlight. Determined not to lose this battle, Dru sidled up the steps towards Spike to wrap herself around the lean body of her childe.

“Mummy misses her boy and daddy has been so horribly nasty. Won’t you come home and look after me, my Spike?” He didn’t have a chance to reject her offer as a savage growl was ripped from behind him and Buffy flew past him and towards the vampiress.

Spike saw Dru’s eyes light up as she saw the blonde charging at her in blind jealousy and rage. A second too late he yelled a warning, and he could do nothing but watch helplessly as Dru’s claw like fingernails struck.




Chapter 15


Spike sat alone on the small cot that was situated in the corner of the Slayer’s basement. He listened to the house slowly coming to life several floors above his head. Red and the cheerleader could be heard getting out of bed on the second floor as could dog boy a few doors down. The whelp, surprisingly enough, could be heard getting into the shower and Joyce was just entering the kitchen. The Slayer was in the living room as she recounted the details of Dru’s little visit to her Watcher.

Slowly Spike let his head fall back against the wall behind him. Dru’s visit. It had certainly opened his eyes to say the least. His life had changed so vastly in the last week and Dru’s visit had been the icing on the cake.

He hadn’t even hesitated in his cry to warn the Slayer. Blind panic had gripped him, and in that moment he had been sure he was about to witness the Slayer’s throat being ripped out as he had with countless other victims in the past.

Buffy had seen the claws and dodged them effortlessly as she took the vampiress to the ground. Yet Spike was shaken from what he had seen occur.

Spike was barely even aware of the cry or warning that had been unconsciously torn from his lips as he made his way towards the two women. Instinct was telling him to get Dru away from Buffy….so Dru couldn’t hurt her.

Not once had it entered his mind to protect his sire—his Ripe Wicked Plum—from Buffy’s attack. Time had stopped and his body had screamed ‘Buffy!’ and in that moment he knew himself to be a doomed man. He was falling for the little blonde spitfire. He was falling in love with the Slayer—with Buffy.

He groaned and began to repeatedly bash his head back against the stone wall of the basement. He heard her soft giggle as she wished her friends a good morning as they left for the day before heading up to bed and his body reacted to her as it always had: his muscles tightened in response and something began to coil in the pit of his stomach as he felt himself start to harden against the zipper of his jeans. Only this time, he recognised it for what it was. Not anticipation for the fight to come, but the anticipation of the desire she could light within him at the sound of her voice.

He let out a frustrate growl. He was so screwed.

Spike heard the rustle and the light thud as Buffy’s clothes hit the floor, closely followed by the sound of a drawer being opened and shut as she most likely pulled out her sleepwear. His mind conjured up the images against his will. The soft material of the overly large t-shirt he knew she wore to bed as she slipped it over her arms and head and let the material caress her skin as it fell around her body.

He heard the light footsteps as she padded her way across to her bed and lifted up the sleep-softened sheets, slipping beneath them and moulding them around her body. Oh, to be a sheet.

“Oh, to be a wanker,” he said out loud in a sarcastic tone as he shook his head and tried to clear the images he had evoked. One look at his groin and he knew he wasn’t going to get any sleep until he had taken care of the barge pole sized erection that was straining painfully against the rough material of his jeans.

“You’re a pathetic git, mate,” he said to himself even as he unzipped his jeans and took his swollen member into his hands.

The images came effortlessly as he caressed himself. He pictured her as he had first seen her dancing at the Bronze, as she had felt when she had jumped him in front of her mates, as she had looked and felt as she ground into him as he had fed off her and again when her fangs had been buried deep within his neck as she marked him, the jealous look she had in her eyes as she flew at his sire and finally how she had looked after dusting one of Angel’s minions when he had first seen her demon.

He let out a whimpering growl as his hand picked up speed and the last image stuck within him. His demon visage slipped through unconsciously as he let out little growls of pleasure. He felt the tightness as his balls clenched just moments before his climax hit and he shot his load as her name left his lips in a whispered cry.

He was panting unnecessarily as he slowly brought himself down from the high. He glanced down at his soiled shirt and jeans.

“Fuck,” he whispered as his eyes scanned the room for something with which to clean himself up. They landed on the washing machine and he made a quick decision. Getting up, he toed his boots off before slipping off both his jeans and t-shirt.

He cleaned himself up with the black material before striding over and throwing them into the machine and hitting the start button.

“Pathetic.”


***



Buffy lay staring at the ceiling as she allowed scenes from the night before play through her head. The images of Dru coiling herself around Spike and batting her lashes at him in a coy manner still made her want to rip the bitch apart limb by limb. Spike was hers.

She frowned as she rolled onto her side and let her gaze drift out the window, unsure whether it was the domination claim she had over him talking or herself. She turned the idea over in her head as she held her arm out into the sunlight that was streaming through the curtains and onto the bed.

She smiled as she watched the faint glow appear on her skin.

Nothing that she had researched on claims had said anything about them inducing possessive and protective emotions. At least not with domination claims; those feelings were connected to mating rituals.

She let out a soft groan as an intense feeling of pleasure washed over her suddenly at the thought. Her hand unconsciously moved under the covers to hover over her stomach as she let the feeling coil itself around her body. It never even occurred to her that the pleasure wasn’t her own.

Thoughts of Spike surfaced as she pictured him sleeping in the cot two levels below her. Would he sleep naked? She wondered as another wave swept over her, pulsing against her skin and making her break out in goose bumps. Oh, definitely. She could picture the sculpted look of his back and leans hips, the sheet barely covering his muscled butt as he slept.

She felt the moisture pool in the panties she had slipped on before climbing into bed. What would he do if she went down there? A slight whimper was torn from her lips as the vibrations against her skin became more intense. The hand that had moved to cover her stomach now dropped lower and brushed against her clit through her panties before pushing down and rubbing it.

Almost immediately the sensations around her grew. It felt like someone was stretching a rubber band within her somewhere and was just waiting for it to snap. She pushed down harder, desperately wanting the sensations to stop and keep going all at once.

The memories of how they had kissed that first night after he had seen her demon rose until she could almost taste him again, and feel his fingertips as they dug into her hips as his knee roughly parted her legs as he slammed her against the side of the house. She growled.

Her panting hitched as the vibrations around her skin broke out into heated prickles just moments before she flew over the edge. Her back warped away from the mattress and her mouth opened in a silent scream as the sensations ripped through her body.

The vibrations left her skin as she began to calm until all that was left was a slight tingle around her thighs. She lay panting unnecessarily at the ceiling as she tried to calm herself down. A slow smiled spread its way across her lips. It was definitely all her.

Her entire body was emitting a soft glow and her panties were drenched. She could smell the heavy perfume of her arousal hanging in the air and she let out a soft whimper of contentment. Her body felt heavy and sated as she let out a soft giggle.





 
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