TumbleTurnOverflow

by
Tabaqui

Part Seven

"So why haven't your pals fixed you all up, then?" Spike asked, watching the lion-vampire fiddle with the lighter and spoon. It seemed Dru came bearing all kinds of gifts.

"They don't know," Xander said on a sigh, and Spike shot him an astonished look.

"Don't know? C'mon, Harris, you can't make me believe you didn't go running."

"Fuck you. I didn't 'go running'. I...well, about a year after it all happened, I told Giles. I told him he couldn't tell the girls. They didn't need to know."

"And Red'd have your balls, wouldn't she." Spike licked his lips, watching the other vamp approach. Leaning forward and quivering like a dog on a leash, just waiting to be let free.

"I just - didn't... I didn't care, okay? It'd be this big...to do and...and I didn't..." Xander shook his head, looking down - looking away. Listening and knowing exactly what was going on. After a minute the other vamp moved away - heading downstairs where Dru and the other two were setting up something. Spell, Dru had said. All part of the 'cure'.

"Couldn't care, you mean," Spike said, his voice already lower - slower.

Xander picked at a callus on his palm, worrying the thick flesh. "I was - afraid I'd talk to them and just...feel nothing. So I just avoid them, mostly." 'And they're busy. Busy busy girls. Only heard from them a few times, anyway...doesn't matter...' "I remember what it feels like, to love them. I don't wanna...find out I really don't anymore."

"Coward," Spike muttered, and Xander jerked around to face him, incredulous.

"You're kidding, right? You get human and you can't deal with fucking - bodily functions and I'm the coward? Fuck you, Spike!"

"Not remotely the bloody same, Harris." Spike seemed to be fighting the drug - or maybe it wasn't working so good for him anymore. "I'm not supposed to be this way. I'm a fucking demon that's been - been locked into a fucking cage. Foul, rotting cage..." Spike looked down at himself with a grimace of disgust and Xander wanted to hit him.

"Bullshit, that's so much -"

"It's not. Red could undo that spell - think she couldn't? But you're too sodding embarrassed to admit you did it so you just - huddle here. Hide from the bloody world and try to think of the next best way to off yourself."

"No she can't," Xander snapped. He pushed himself off the couch and strode over to the right-hand window. Stood there, staring out at the lights of the city. The red and white smears of head and tail lights on the highway and the lone, drifting glimmer of a barge on the river. "Giles - told her. He didn't say it was me, just...someone. They worked on it for like, six months. She couldn't crack it."

"Doesn't mean she wouldn't. -"

"She won't. Spike -" Xander turned around and then just leaned on the window, hip propped on the sill. He was so fucking...tired. Just tired. 'Imagine how tired you'll be in a hundred years. In a thousand...' "I didn't invite Dru in. She just came in. I'm not...right. Not anymore."

Spike was staring at him, eyes half closed and his eyes themselves sunk in bruised-looking flesh. Shadowed and still, already miles and molecules away. "S'that why you...why you hid -" Spike gestured at his face and Xander nodded.

"Giles knows but - I mean, there'd be questions for sure if anybody else did. They'd wanna come see...like some kind of fucking...freak show. I didn't know if you'd tell so..." He shrugged. Yeah, it sounded stupid, even in his own head. But it was just one more thing. One more too-obvious sign of his own incredible stupidity. Lying was so much easier, anyway.

"Ignorant sodding bastard," Spike muttered, and his eyes fluttered closed. He looked like a hard-used doll, lying there. Jumble of too-thin limbs and ragged hair and Xander almost walked over to him - almost tugged the throw up around him and smoothed it over his chest. Almost.

Instead, he went into the kitchen and took the last bottle of tequila out of the liquor store bag and cracked the seal. 'Comfort in routine. She's gonna kill him in my fucking downstairs living room. Undo whatever the Powers did.' Xander took a long, burning gulp and coughed. There was a sharp crack from downstairs and a rumble of soft laughter, and he shuddered all over. 'God, she's gonna take his soul. He fought for that, he - won it. Wanted it. What the fuck am I gonna do?'

He lifted the bottle to his lips, chill glass just touching his skin. "Take another drink, I guess," he murmured. It seemed like the best solution.

"I'm not gonna be part of this, Spike," Xander snapped, and Spike looked like he wanted to put his fist through the wall - or Xander's face.

"Well, too bloody bad! Dru said you have to and you can either come down all quiet like or she can have her fucking Sabertooth clone drag you." Spike grimaced and shifted, pushing himself unsteadily to his feet. "She really doesn't give a flying fuck, mate, but I'm trying to give you some dignity, here."

"Dignity? Says the man who stumbled around bare-ass naked in my hotel room."

"Was fucking high, you moron. It kind of cancels out shite like that."

"I can see why you like it so much, then."

"Oh, bloody hell!" Spike half-hopped two steps toward the stairs and Xander turned away from him, arms crossed, staring into the fire. Ignoring him. "Oi, you! Sabertooth! Shift your arse and get up here. Harris needs some bloody motivation."

Xander turned sharply, glaring at Spike. "Fuck you, Spike! I am not going down there!" He watched, furious, as the big, blond vampire trotted up the stairs and strode across the floor. He came to a stop much, much too close to Xander, arms crossed and a fangy grin on his face. "Fuck off."

"The lady says get you," Sabertooth said, all gleeful anticipation. He twisted his fist in Xander's Henley shirt and turned around - dragged him toward the stairs. Xander landed two good punches and then Sabertooth turned around and punched back.

"Ow!" Xander tried a knee to the groin and Sabertooth punched him again and then it was all a little confused and - floaty. Or flying. Or something. All Xander knew for sure was that he landed hard.

"Glad you could join us," Spike said, sitting cross legged in what looked like the middle of a Spirograph design. The blonde vampire was just finishing up, popping the tourniquet off Spike's arm and bundling the works away. Spike's back arched and he groaned softly, lips curling back from his teeth in a rictus smile.

Xander concentrated on the floor. 'She carved that into my fucking floor. Take me forever to sand that out, Jesus...' "Oh, fuck off, Spike! Look what she did to my floor!"

"Boys - no fighting." Drusilla ghosted in from somewhere, soundless on bare feet. Her hair loose and curled around her shoulders, her eyes gleaming in the light of dozens of candles. "It's the night of All Soul's. We must pray for all those sad ghosts trapped in Purgatory." She had a rosary in her fingers, wound loosely around and around and Xander realized with a grimace it was made of little bones.

"Drusilla..." It was weird, saying her name. As if he knew her - as if she was someone to him. "I - I really don't think you need me here -"

"Of course we do, sweet." Dru made a little gesture and Sabertooth was suddenly kneeling behind Xander, yanking his arms back hard and - shit. Xander remembered handcuffs all too well. He twisted, useless attempt to free himself.

"Hey! What the fuck -" Sabertooth-vamp put his hand over Xander's mouth, pinching hard. His skin smelled like smoke and spice from the candles - like earth, and Xander tried to wrench away. It was like fighting a statue. 'Fuck, fuck, fuck! Knew this would go bad, knew this was a bad fucking idea. Terrible fucking idea - ow! God damnit -'

"Hush, kitten, hush, hush." Dru glided across the design, her fingertips trailing lightly over Spike's hair as she passed him. She stood over Xander, the rosary clutched in both her hands. The cross on it was stained with blood and it was bound together with what looked like some sort of dried sinew. Xander sat frozen, flexing his wrists. Sabertooth's hand was digging in painfully around his bicep, a grip as hard and cold as a machine's. "This cure we've found - this spell we'll work... It's going to be a hard thing." She looked over her shoulder at Spike, who was keeling over just a little, his eyes half-shut. He was holding the journal again, stroking the worn cover.

Dru leaned down, her face close to Xander's and he tried reflexively to lean back. Sabertooth shook him. "It's going to wring his bones like a mangle, kitten. It's going to hurt, oh so much. He'll need fresh blood, when he wakes. And your blood..." Dru's hand reached and touched Xander's forehead - stroked back through his hair, the bones of the rosary swaying against his lashes - his eyelid. "Your blood will be so rich. So special. Just what he'll need."

Drusilla's scent was of roses and burning and musk and Xander shuddered, jerking against the hold on his jaw - the cuffs. Feeling his heart pound harder - faster. Panicky rhythm that made him dizzy as he panted through his nose. 'No, no, no! What if they turn me - can they turn me? God - blood on the hoof for Spike and his crazy-assed girlfriend - why the fuck is my life so fucked up?'

"You'll be... a'right, Harriss" Spike slurred, and Xander glared at him as Dru walked away. "Can't kill you, can I?" He laughed, rusty and strange, and then Dru was kneeling down in front of him, touching his lips - holding a cup to them and Spike was drinking, his hands lightly over hers.

"Guess you're about the best little human around," Sabertooth murmured, cool breath on the back of Xander's neck. "Can't kill you - got magic in your blood I can smell from a hundred feet. Can just drain you whenever we want..." Xander whipped his head back sharply, hoping to catch Sabertooth in the forehead but the vampire laughed softly, dodging easily and pinching Xander's jaw a little harder - hard enough to make Xander go instantly still. "Don't piss me off, kitten. I'll pull your claws."

"Shhhh..." Dru said. She set the cup aside and laid her hand flat on the journal that was in Spike's lap. "You won't need this anymore, Sir Galahad," she said, and Spike blinked sleepily, looking down at the book then back up to Dru in a bewildered sort of way.

"Tried to find you, love. I did. I tried - followed all the c-clues...never gave up, Dru, I never..."

"I know you didn't. I could feel you, following me. Like a bee just behind me, drone and hum... I left you a trail of honey-blood, my Spike..."

"Yours," Spike murmured, and then he was slumping over, eyes going shut and Dru caught him - held him easily.

"Oh, yes, all mine, no matter what Daddy might say. Always mine." Dru's features shifted with a soft crunch and Xander tried to look away - tried to get free. He couldn't do either. He watched as Dru licked a slow path from Spike's collarbone to just below his ear. Her gold-glimmering gaze found Xander's and she smiled at him. Opened her mouth and sank her fangs into Spike's throat and Xander finally closed his eyes.

He couldn't keep them closed, though. Sooner than he expected he could hear Dru moving - speaking - and then her voice dropping into a low, sing-song chant. Hissing out the spell in strange, sibilant words that seemed to itch over Xander's skin. Sabertooth let him go, shoving him back into a wall and Xander watched him walk over behind Dru and stand there, arms crossed, scowling. Dru was bleeding from a cut on her arm, gesturing with a small knife and the cup Spike had drained, blood drops spattering over the floor. The blonde girl-vamp and dreadlock vamp were standing opposite Dru, just outside the edges of the design. A strange, flickering light was swirling in slowly from the corners of the room - pale illumination that crept along the lines of the design and twined around Spike, slipping under him and over him. Into his mouth and nostrils and ears, under his shut lids. His body twitched and rippled as if a million ants were crawling under his skin and it was making Xander feel sick.

'Fuck, just get it over with, get it done, this is...fucking horrible...' Xander twitched against the wall, rubbing his shoulders and the back of his head across the wood. Trying to make the plucking, prickling feeling of the magic stop. He could feel his hair lifting off his head - his clothing bunching and clinging as static electricity built and built, going higher as Dru's voice did.

There was a sudden snap of energy and a popping, crackling fire shot out from Spike and raced across every line of the design - flared and grew and then leapt, arc of lightning that arrowed into the blonde and the dreadlocked vampire - into Sabertooth as Dru deftly twisted aside. All three vampires screamed in unison, pinned to the air by the flickering fire. The fire sank into them and lit them from the inside, brighter and brighter until they were pillars of flame banded by the darker stripes of bone.

With a roar the light sank - pulled itself back and in and down and the vampires followed it, dissolving into dust and ash and darkness, streaming along the fire's path. Melting into nothing as the fire swarmed over Spike, lifting him - turning him. And Spike's mouth opened and he screamed.

It took too long - way too fucking long - for Spike to stop screaming. The air stank of ozone and burnt bone and ash - charred wood and hair and blood and Xander fought to keep from throwing up all the tequila he'd drunk. And every meal for the last three days. Spike's voice cut off abruptly, the raw, choking scream going silent and leaving Xander's ears ringing. Dru stood at the edge of the design, her toes just beyond the blackened lines. She was white - shaking - stained with ashes and blood, her gaze fixed on Spike. Xander pushed against the wall, pushing himself up until he was standing. His wrists ached from the clasp of the handcuffs.

"Spike?"

"Hush, boy. Hush now...let him -"

Spike was lying, twisted and slightly smoking, in the center of the design. Motionless for long moments and then he moved. Took in a hard, gasping breath, jack-knifing upright. His clothes were singed and torn, hanging off him and he scrabbled at the hoodie and t-shirt, tearing them free. Underneath, his skin was smooth as cream, shining like bone in the shifting light of the guttering candles. He took another breath, eyes wide, and then caught sight of Drusilla. Instantly his face shifted and Dru smiled at him, holding out her hand. Crooning to him as if he were a gun-shy dog.

'Not a dog anymore. Fucking tiger...burning bright...what the hell is that? Have to ask Spike, he'd know...' Xander stifled the hysterical giggle that threatened to well up and burst out of him. Asking Spike - anything - was going to be... 'Fucking joke. He's not - there anymore. He's gone, just a monster now, no soul and no....him. Nothing.'

"Come on, love - come here to me. You must come here to me, pretty thing..." Drusilla took a step back and Spike coiled upward, standing so easily it made Xander blink. The sweats slid down, off Spike's hips and over his feet and Spike kicked them away - shredded the socks off his feet and stood there, his head tipping one way and then another as he watched Dru. Mouth a little open as if he were drawing in breath and scent. Then he stepped forward and walked. No limp, no hesitation. Remade.

As he stepped over the edge of the design it flared to life behind him - flared up bright and then winked out, leaving nothing but a rough circle of scorched wood. Spike didn't even seem to notice, every bit of his attention focused on Dru. Xander tried not to breathe - tried to make his heart pound a little slower and quieter, for fuck's sake, hoping Spike wouldn't notice him. Wouldn't see him at all.

"Dru...ssilla..." Spike whispered, and Dru seemed to shiver all over. She let the cup and knife fall to the floor - reached out to Spike and met his hands as they reached for her. Spike pulled her close, his arms wrapping around her, his eyes going shut as he leaned there with her, forehead to forehead. Breathing softly, deliberately. Then he opened his eyes and Xander froze, pinned under that brass-gold stare.

"Spike, don't, don't -"

"Look what mummy's got for your tea, Spike. Something fresh and good to make you strong."

"How you look after me," Spike rumbled, nuzzling into Dru's hair for a moment. Then he slipped away from her and toward Xander, his head down, his mouth twisting up into a sly sort of smile. Muscles rolling under his skin, nothing but pure predator in that lion-deadly gaze.

Xander tried to slide away, back to the wall, his knuckles scraping along the plaster. "Spike - don't. I'm - we're -." 'Fuck. We're not friends - we're not even comrades. Jesus...Christ...' "Do you - don't you remember me, Spike?" The jamb of one of the downstairs bedroom doors scraped Xander's wrist and he looked frantically over his shoulder at the closed door, trying to find the doorknob.

Spike's hand, cool and heavy, slid over his shoulder and Xander jumped, banging wrist, elbow and head against the wood. "Course I remember you, Harris..." Spike's hand cupped Xander's jaw, turning his head - pressing on the bruises Sabertooth had made. Bruises that would be gone in an hour. Spike was smiling still, fangs glinting ivory-white, his hair still a mess of cork-screwed dreads and lank curls. He stank of blood and salt and something - else. Something dark.

"You're the one can't die, no matter what," Spike murmured, and his lips touched Xander's throat. His tongue did, cool and wet, and the prickle of fangs was like a nettle being touched.

Xander couldn't move back - couldn't move at all - and he heard his breath going high and panting as his heart pounded behind his breastbone, thudding beats that hurt. "Spike - wait, wait! C'mon, please -"

"Won't hurt you, Xander. Won't hurt at all," Spike whispered, his arms sliding around Xander like a snake - his body pressing, cool and snake-heavy and boneless. Pressing Xander tight to the door.

Spike was right, it didn't hurt at all. Until it did.

Part Eight

"Kitty, kitty, kitty... Wake up, little kitty..." Something cool and wet, on his face - his lips - and Xander jerked away, gasping. Drusilla leaned over him, her wet hair dripping water onto his face. "Do you want a nice bowl of milk, kitty-kitty?"

"Don't," Xander said. Tried to say. His mouth was dry and his shoulders and chest ached - a bone-deep throb of muscles strained too long in one position. His wrists inside the cuffs were killing him - they felt raw, like they were bleeding, although he was pretty sure Dru or Spike would have said something. Done...something. Xander shuddered. Shuddered again when Dru's fingers slid down his cheek and cupped his jaw - made him look up.

"Spike says you have to eat, kitty. I thought bread and milk but Spike says kitties like meat."

"Spike can go fuck himself and you can, too," Xander grated out. His throat was raw and his voice was hoarse and 'God, oh god, just go the fuck away, go away and leave me alone, leave me alone, I don't care -'

"Don't use that sort of language in front of my girl," Spike said, sliding in from nowhere, water in silver trails over his chest. He took a lot of baths.

"Fuck off," Xander muttered, and Spike reached down and hauled Xander up by his shirt-front, tearing it a little more. Jerking Xander much, much too close to naked vampire bodies.

"Don't be a smart-ass, Xander," Spike purred, his lips just brushing Xander's ear. He pushed at Xander's hair with his nose, nuzzling and snuffling a little, moving down and Xander tried to jerk away. "Stand still."

Dru pressed up against Xander's front, her arms going around his waist. Her hands, warmed from the water, circled Xander's wrists and squeezed hard. Xander froze, panting. "Don't make Spike angry, kitty." Dru's eyes glittered in the candle light, a deep, velvety brown. "You know what happens."

"I - know." That knowledge made Xander shiver all over, his breath coming out in a shocky little gasp. "Spike, just - don't, okay? Just -"

"Be quiet, little kitty, or I'll have to muzzle you." Spike's eyes were bright with sardonic amusement and Xander looked away into the golden haze of candles and the low, slanting light of sunset. Tried hard not to feel Spike's naked body pressed solidly against him from shoulder to thigh. Tried not to feel Dru's lips, kissing their way slowly over his collarbone to her 'favorite' spot.

'Can't take this, can't do this...so fucking stupid, so fucking - god, no, no, no -' "No," Xander whispered, but their fangs sank in anyway, twin sets of ivory needles. The rush - the sudden, heart-tripping heat of it made him moan softly and he barely noticed when they finished. When Dru and then Spike pulled away and eased him back down onto the floor. Spike's fingers were at his lips, pressing something between them and Xander felt the pill roll onto his tongue - swallowed the tequila that followed. It was swallow or choke, and Xander didn't want to cough, just now. Not the way his ribs were aching.

Xander rolled onto his side, wincing at the pressure on his arm. Spike was still crouched right there, his elbows tucked back against his sides and his hands on his knees. "Go 'way, Spike."

"Pretty soon," Spike said. He ran his hands back over his skull, an odd look on his face. Dru had tried to comb his hair out but it had been too matted and they'd ended up clipping it all off. Now Spike's hair was an inch-long brush of light brown. Nothing like his bleached-blond Sunnydale days. Xander thought he looked like a gladiator.

'The kind that killed the Christians. The crowd'd love him...he'd always draw first blood...send the lions running...'

"Getting better in here."

Xander jerked a little, startled. He'd managed to almost completely tune Spike out. "Huh?"

"I said, it's getting better. In here." Spike tapped his temple. "They're fading away, those...others. Like they should. Nothing but shades, anyway. Shades and shadows..." Spike ran his hand back over his skull again, slowly. Looking into some middle distance, his eyes dark. "Don't know how she did it, Xander. Don't know how she...knew." Spike's focus shortened until he was looking at Xander again, summer-blue eyes dilated with drug - with blood. Like Xander's were, he knew. Xander blinked, sinking toward that half-sleep state they mostly kept him in.

'Oxycontin and blood-loss, unbeatable combo. Why didn't I think of this before? Jesus,fight it -'

"She made it like...it all never happened. My leg...and..." Spike's hand went to his chest, absently rubbing, and Xander shut his eyes.

He'd had scars there once. They were gone now, too. 'Just like his soul. No soul, no...scars. No love.'

"No, kitty. We love. Would have thought you'd have learned that by now." Xander opened his eyes wide, fighting the drug. Spike was looking oddly at him, a little grin on his face. "You didn't say that out loud."

"J-Jesus, Spike, wh-what -?"

Spike gestured with his chin toward Dru, who was fastening up the bodice of an old-fashioned looking dress. It was ragged around the hem and the ends of the sleeves. "It's her, you know. Her blood in the spell. Gave me...something."

"So you're...nuts now...too?" Xander asked, sluggish, and Spike laughed softly.

"Nah. Just - a little touched. But it's true, you know. I ache with it, Xander. With love. For her...for - others."

"Don't call me...that."

"Why not?"

"Not mmm...my friend," Xander slurred. His eyelids were too heavy to hold open anymore and he let them close. Let the world - his house - slip away into spangled darkness.

"Dunno what I am," Spike said, his voice slipping sideways into the black. Last sliver of light, blue-white and shimmering. And then Xander sank, and all the light was gone.

When he woke up, he was upstairs. Wrapped in the quilt from his bed, propped on pillows in front of a purring fire. The handcuffs were gone. Xander lay there, staring at the bed of embers under the half-consumed logs. They seemed to ripple with the heat, like a slowly undulating snake. He could feel - he knew... The house was empty. Spike and Dru were gone. The sky through the window was navy and deep violet, the sun only down an hour, at the most. There was a bottle of tequila by him and he pushed himself slowly up onto his elbow - uncapped it and took a long drink. As he lowered the bottle back to the floor, he saw the bruises around his wrist. Plum, blue - rot-green and sickly yellow. As he stared, the yellow faded and the green yellowed, all of it becoming...lighter. Fading. Leaving...nothing. Xander swallowed hard but he knew he was going to be sick.

He grabbed Spike's foot-soaking tub - sitting right there next to the bottle - and gagged up tequila and bile until his stomach hurt. He flopped back on the pillows, panting. Feeling tears oozing out from the corners of his eyes and not even caring. Not thinking for even one minute why the tub had been there, or the bottle.

'Hate you, Spike, you fucker, you bastard, you fucking undead god damn monster, why did you...why couldn't you... Fucking hate you.'

Over the next five months, Xander managed to keep himself mostly drunk at all times. It wasn't much of an effort. He finished off his Oxycontin, too, and got a refill but mostly only looked at them. He didn't like the fuzziness. He wanted things to stay...clear. Diamond-bright. Drinking made it all like crystal, with an edge like a razor.

He spent a lot of time staring in the mirror, looking for the scars from Dru's mouth and Spike's. There weren't any, though, and it made him wonder if he'd dreamed it all. Except...there was a circle of scorched wood downstairs in the empty formal dining room, and he'd go and sit in the middle sometimes. Remembering when he was the heart, once.

'Can't be the heart when you've lost yours. Or maybe I've lost my soul...maybe that's why Drusilla could come right in. Giles said a vamp doesn't need an invite into another demon's...lair. So maybe I'm just a soulless thing now. Sitting in my lair.' Xander laughed softly and stood up, the bottle in his hand thumping on the floor. Flakes of char broke away, sticking to the glass.

His phone was ringing upstairs - he could hear it. He knew it was Giles. He'd picked up once, back in...January. Something about sending some Slayers - something about him moving on. Something about life. He'd told Giles he really wasn't up to having one, right then. Call back later, maybe.

'Like in a couple hundred years. Maybe I'll feel like... Maybe I'll feel, then.' He wasn't sure how despair, bitterness - grief - weren't a vulnerability. Maybe you could only truly be hurt when you were happy. Maybe the heart-enlarging effects of love and joy and singing on Christmas morning even if the roast beast was gone was the reason your heart shattered when the other shoe...kicked it. 'You're so fucking drunk...you don't even know...'

"Don't know a bloody thing, do you, Harris?"

"Did I say that out loud?" Xander asked, turning slowly, and Spike smirked at him from the door.

"What do you think?" Spike asked, and pushed away from the jamb. Sauntered over to Xander and he was Spike again. Not the wreck of bone and skin and bitterness from October - not the too-quiet man who'd ducked his head and stepped aside in the last days of Sunnydale. But the man - vampire - he'd been years ago, before an invisible choke-chain and a broken heart. This was the Spike who'd promised Buffy that she would die in four days and Xander felt a prickle of fear scuttle up his back.

"I think... Where's Drusilla?"

Spike's expression altered a little, his amused look fading to something like bewilderment for a moment. "She's off chasing rainbows, she is." Spike stopped just where the charred wood started - scuffed at it with his toe. Xander just stood there, watching him. A little dizzy, a lot exhausted. Sick to death.

"Got some proper drink, then?" Spike asked, jerking his chin upwards and Xander nodded.

"Got enough to get a vampire drunk," Xander replied, and lifted his own bottle to his lips, gulping. Raw burn and heat and that little flushing rush. Close to what it had felt like when...heat, hurt, it all goes away...

"Missed me, did you?" Spike asked, suddenly much too close and much too real - lips and eyes and smoldering cigarette right there.

Xander blinked and took a step back. "You started smoking again."

Spike lifted his cigarette and took a drag, watching Xander. The little smile was back. "Yeah. Bothered me before. Hurt my throat - made me 'bout fucking strangle. Bloody stupid."

"Don't set anything on fire," Xander said, and jerked himself away from that steady - unsteadying - regard. He led Spike upstairs and grabbed a bottle of Jack from the kitchen - tossed it over and went to the fireplace. The April nights were chilly and he'd had a fire burning since November, it seemed. It was almost like having someone there, a fire was. It talked in its own secret language and Xander found he turned the TV off more and more and just sat, listening to the hissing, popping rush of it.

Now he leaned one shoulder against the stone of the surround and watched Spike prowl from point to point, touching things here and there. A restless cat, dissatisfied, until he found his journal lying in state on the small table under the window. He put the bottle down and touched the cover of the journal with careful fingertips, looking over at Xander finally, that scarred eyebrow going up in a move that was...

'Just like then, hasn't changed...isn't the same...'

"Why'd you keep it?"

Xander shrugged - took another drink. "I dunno. I just... It was different. 'It was you. It was my last link with...older things. It's like something Giles would do or Willow, it's...'

"Regret," Spike said softly, and Xander nodded. Regret. Exactly. Spike lifted the journal and undid the bindings on it - began to leaf through it, walking slowly toward Xander. Xander took another drink, watching him.

Spike shook his head, laughing softly. "This is worse than that bloody idiot Castaneda. What babble." Spike touched a page of words that seemed to have been written in blood. Xander wondered if it had been his own, or someone else's.

"All mine, mate. No worries there."

"That's really freaking me out, man."

Spike's gaze darted up to Xander's, a flashing glance of amusement and glee. "Doesn't work on everybody. Thank Christ - can you imagine the inane prattle I'd be forced to listen to in clubs? No..." Spike crouched down, leafing to the very end of the journal and staring for a long moment at the sketch of the dead woman. "It only works sometimes." He reached out and settled the journal on the burning logs, balancing it carefully. The tattered edges of the clippings fluttered in the heat and then began to curl and blacken. Spike rubbed his hand on his thigh and stood up.

Xander stared down at the fire - at the journal. At the death-locked stare of the woman, watching her flayed skin and the bright skein of blood under her jaw blacken and crumble. "So - what makes it work?"

"Not sure, really," Spike said. He sent his cigarette butt after the journal and then turned to Xander, toe to toe, nearly touching. "I just know it has to be someone...special."

"Special how?" Xander asked.

"Shut up," Spike whispered. He leaned forward the few inches between them, his eyes going half-lidded and dark. Drawing in a long breath through his mouth, his fingers curling slowly around Xander's wrists. Xander felt the bottle slip out of his hand - bump knee and shin and clunk unharmed to the wooden floor, rolling away. Leaving an arc of liquid behind as it rolled, golden with reflected flame.

It hurt like it had the first time, lying under mosquito netting and a black-haired South African boy, biting his lip until it bled. Evan had stopped instantly, letting out a small sound of distress - waiting while Xander pried his hands open, nails sunk into Evan's skin. Waited for it to be good again.

Spike only pushed harder, his head dipping down and his tongue - cool and agile - slipping along Xander's lip, gathering the blood into his own mouth. Sucking gently while Xander struggled fruitlessly under him and then gave up, panting.

"Sspike -"

"Push against me," Spike murmured, his tongue busy elsewhere now and Xander pushed, legs trembling. Pushed and gasped in a hard, hitching breath as Spike breached him fully - slid in. Hot rush of cool flesh, the burn going up the backs of Xander's legs and twisting into his belly - plucking at his balls.

"Christ, that's lovely..." Spike said, breathy whisper in Xander's ear, his forearms under Xander's shoulders, his fingers tight in Xander's hair. Straining his head back, chin to the ceiling and Spike's mouth lapping and nibbling and sucking here, there, there.

Xander shuddered, groaning softly - dug his heel into the back of Spike's thigh and pushed, pushed, pushed - lifted his hips and dragged his hands down Spike's back, fingernails catching on every swell of vertebrae. "Spike - Jesus -" Spike's shoulder was right there, curve of skin that glowed in the firelight like mother of pearl. Finer than a human's skin - poreless and perfect and Xander craned his head down and bit, hard.

"Fuck - yeah..." Spike's hips jerked forward and Xander's whole body locked tight as he rode the wave of burning, shuddering ache.

"Just - lemme - Spike, wait -" Xander clawed at Spike's back but Spike only arched like a Halloween tom, his gaze meeting Xander's all pumpkin-gold and feral, lips snarling back from needle-pointed fangs.

"Too late," Spike growled, lifting and pulling and then pushing back in, harder and faster and twist of hips right there, right there and Xander sucked in oxygen gone rare and bright-edged, keening. There was an oval of red on Spike's perfect shoulder and Xander focused on it - traced the indentations of his teeth and let his hands slide lower - let them cup and then squeeze the dense, flexing muscle.

"Why'd you - c-come back?" Xander asked, and Spike tugged at his hair - pushed Xander's chin up again with a nudge of his cheek.

"Junkie, aren't I? Can't get enough." Spike's voice was amused - slightly breathless - and his fangs slid in easily, two slim wands of burning ice. The fire was white-gold-scarlet in the edges of Xander's vision, dancing and growing as he opened wide - eyes, mouth, thighs - to Spike. As he shuddered, spitted and arched and writhing, to a bone-wringing orgasm.

When the room blinked back from nuclear-white to saffron-glow and the low murmur of the fire, Spike was still on him - in him. Moving with the slow undulation of a snake, heavy and cool and totally inescapable. Xander's legs were sprawled, bent and heavy and too weak to move. Xander let his head roll to the side as Spike lapped at his throat, thorough cleaning of a mother cat.

"M'not a cat," Spike grumbled.

"What's that?" Xander asked, letting his hand slide off Spike's back and flop limply on the floor. Flopped in the general direction of the slim, silver flask that was slipping out of Spike's coat pocket.

"Mmm? Oh. That's something Dru made up, just for you." Spike shifted, pushing himself up - kneeling back, shifting Xander's hips up onto his thighs. "Hold on, now, Xander. Hold tight."

Xander flexed his hips and thighs, watching Spike's eyes flutter, his head going back. Spike grinned down at him, all curious angles and planes - red between his fangs. "Thought Dru left."

"Eventually," Spike said. He stretched for the flask and Xander sighed, his own eyes closing at the press and rub of Spike's cock on sensitized flesh. "But not before she left me this little...aperitif, you might say."

"I doubt I'd say it."

Spike ignored him - unscrewed the lid and took a delicate sniff. Then he put his hand around the back of Xander's neck and hauled him upright, settling him onto cock and thighs with casual strength. Xander whimpered, bracing his forearms on Spike's shoulders, his head heavy on his neck.

"What the - fuck -"

"Just a little something from her to you. Drink up, now."

The flask's edge was cool and it tasted of iron and Xander ducked away, grimacing. Spike's fingers dug in on either side of his spine, pinching hard and Xander arched away from the stabbing pain and then froze as Spike shook him a little.

"Don't fucking fight me, Xander. Drink it. Won't hurt you."

Xander batted weakly at the flask - yelped when Spike pinched even harder, everything going blood-red for a moment as needling heat raced down his spine. And through his cock. 'Fuck, fuck - oh god, that's - fucking sick it's - good, so damn -'

"Always knew you were a kinky bugger," Spike murmured, his voice delighted and a little cracked and Xander ground their bodies together, gasping for air.

"Don't, just - Spike -"

"Drink it." Spike pushed the flask against Xander's mouth again, tipping it, and fluid spilled out and sluiced into Xander's mouth. Thick and cold and slippery, tasting of vinegar and salt and citrus. Tasting of earth and rot and Xander tried to gag - tried to spit it out. But Spike's hand was on his chin now, holding his mouth shut. Arm around his back and fingertips just stroking his throat and Xander twisted and choked and swallowed, shuddering. The fluid snaked down his throat and into his belly and he could feel it uncoiling there, like a knot of worms going free. Spike let his chin go and Xander worked his tongue through the dregs.

"What the - what the fuck - god -"

"Oh, good, good kitty." Spike looked delighted. He pushed Xander over with a thump, following him down and getting one of Xander's thighs up over his shoulder, spreading Xander wide under him - crushing him small. "That was bloody marvelous, I could feel you -"

"Shut up, Spike." Xander couldn't seem to make his hands work - his arms. He lay like a ragdoll, watching Spike rock over him, the firelight flickering and dimming as if the fire were guttering out. "What'd you - what's it d-doing? What -"

"Just killing you, Xander, that's all. Just a poison Dru found. Bane and blackest magic to gut that bloody baba yaga's spell."

Xander writhed mutely, the icy worms creeping out and out from his gut - invading every limb. Constricting around his spine and lungs and heart. He could hear his breathe wheezing in his throat - could feel his fingers and toes curling tight. When Spike's wrist, gashed with scarlet, was pressed to his mouth he couldn't fight - couldn't move. He felt Spike's fingers stroking again, over and over so that he swallowed. Spike's blood tasted like woodsmoke and honey.

"Just swallow it down, then. Just a little medicine to make you all better." Spike's eyes seemed to glow - grow - bright as the sun. Hammered gold slitted with black, and Xander felt himself falling into that black. Felt, distantly, Spike moving in him again, faster and harder. He tried to stop his gliding drop into that vast darkness but his fingers were numb and useless - his lungs breathless. "All better," Spike crooned softly, and Xander felt Spike's tongue at the corner of his mouth as Spike's wrist slipped away. "Spoonful of sugar soon, then you'll be right as rain."

'Rain, rain, go away...can you hear me, Spike?'

"I hear you. Shhh...go to sleep." Xander tried to shake his head but he couldn't feel himself anymore - couldn't see, couldn't hear. Sleep...seemed like the best thing, and he let it come. It was cold.

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