The inevitable ‘no’ came back to her, and she didn’t know whether to be pleased or disappointed. After all, as much as it surprised her, she’d come to realize that she didn’t really hate Dru. In fact, the elder vampiress had gone out of her way to make Buffy feel at home in their little family. Even last night – for reasons as of yet unfathomable to Buffy – Dru had taken it upon herself to defend her grandchilde from whatever Xander’s strange motives happened to be.

So Buffy had pretty much decided that she wouldn’t kill Dru. She wasn’t even sure she wanted Dru dead; she just wanted Spike for herself. She just had to beat Drusilla fair and square, break the mating bond with Spike, and then take him for her own mate. She didn’t even think she’d object if Dru stayed around afterwards…although Drusilla inevitably would object to being cast out.

But, whatever the outcome, Buffy had no doubt that it would be the end to the happy little status quo that their family maintained. Which was why she wasn’t too disappointed that she got to enjoy these moments for just a while longer.

With a groan, she got up and stretched. Already her mind felt weary from weighing possible outcomes of the inevitable confrontation. It was starting to give her a headache…

Oh yeah. This is why I hate the Hellmouth. Everything turns into a psychotic power play within minutes…

Shaking the thought off, she moved Spike’s arm from around her waist and got up off of the huge mattress that had been the site of the sexcapades last night. Spike let out a little mumble of protest when she left his side, but then just curled up happily against Dru instead. Apparently, they’d worn out their boy well.

It only took a few seconds for Buffy to give up on trying to find her clothes of last night. The room was in complete disarray. Fortunately, the trunks the three of them had brought to America were still intact. Buffy found a short black dress quickly and slipped it on.

Still no motion from the bed.

It surprised her to note that Willow and Xander were already gone for the evening. A cold little shiver that Willow had been up and about while Buffy was sleeping and helpless. And renewed puzzlement at what exactly had seemed so off about Xander last night. Curious, too, that he hadn’t been as completely drained (metaphorically, of course) as Spike had been. After all, there had been very few penises around last night, and Buffy would’ve figured they’d be in high demand.

The grumbling in her stomach put off all such thoughts to later. Just as she was about to vanish into the night to hunt, a hand came to rest on her shoulder from behind, causing her to jump.

Reason number 926 to hate the Hellmouth: It makes me as jumpy as if I were the prey…

“Xander,” she managed to say calmly when she turned to face the furtive intruder.

The edges of his lips curled, and something like excitement and anger flashed in the back of his dark eyes. “Going hunting?”

She nodded hesitantly.

“Mind if I tag along? I’m starving.”

Buffy couldn’t really think of a good reason to say no. Or, no reason that she could put words to. A vaguely uncomfortable feeling wasn’t really good enough, not if she wanted to avoid picking a fight with Xander. And, given the constant rage that seemed to bubble beneath the surface, Buffy figured it would probably be best just not to piss him off.

She nodded her consent, and the two of them slipped into the shadows.

It wasn’t long before they came upon a college student huddled up in his own jacket and waiting nervously at the bus stop. Buffy distracted him; Xander yanked him into the bushes from behind, and they fed. 

Amiable enough…if not for the dark whispers in Xander’s eyes.

“You’re full already?” Xander demanded when she turned to head home.

Buffy’s back stiffened with the uncomfortable and awkward situation. “Spike should be up by now.”

Xander circled her slowly, looking vaguely menacing but not fully challenging her. For the moment, at least. “He knows you’re among friends. No reason to run back to daddy yet. We’ve still got the whole night ahead of us.” There was a certain venom to the way he said ‘daddy’ that made Buffy nervous.

“Plenty of ways to play back home, too,” she countered pointedly, crossing her arms over her chest to let him know he wasn’t frightening her. And he wasn’t, not really. She could feel that, despite the closeness of their ages, his power wasn’t half of hers. She could take him in a fight, no problem. So she wasn’t frightened. More…unsettled by his strange behavior. “I thought you’d want to get back to your sire as well,” she added diplomatically.

The wrong thing to say, apparently.

Xander’s eyes flashed yellow with rage. “What do you mean by that?” he demanded in a low growl.

Buffy raised one impertinent eyebrow, still standing calmly, unconcerned by his ire. “Temper much?” she demanded. “Or, how about, overreact much? Seems like we both get something out of going back home is all.”

Xander calmed at that and shook his head. “Sorry about that,” he apologized, suddenly conciliatory. 

He managed a wry laugh, one so eerily similar to the light-hearted boy she’d once known that it sent shivers down her spine. He was definitely anything but light-hearted now. Something had changed him, and Buffy was betting on the pit of hell that caressed them from beneath. 

Buffy was becoming increasingly grateful that Spike and Dru had blown town after Dru’s cure. She hadn’t noticed anything at the time – largely because she’d only ever been a vampire in Sunnydale – but the Hellmouth’s weight agitated the demon within, made it harder to control.

“I just don’t feel like heading back yet,” Xander said, seemingly normal now. “How ‘bout we bring something back for the others?”

“Sure,” Buffy accepted the apology with a shrug. After all, the night whispered to her demon, too. A dark power seemed to flow through her body, and all she wanted to do was run through the black of night, free and wild.

A smile lit up Xander’s face that was almost friendly. “Race ya,” he teased as the scent of human fear hit the night air. He was off with a dash.

Buffy laughed, suddenly relaxed again. This was more the Xander she remembered. Safe, friendly Xander. Always joking and laughing. She took off after him.

Their target happened to be a married couple who were standing outside their broken-down vehicle and yelling at each other. Ah, the joys of marriage. Out-of-towners, too, so they probably wouldn’t be familiar with Sunnydale’s vamp situation.

Despite Xander’s head start, Buffy quickly surpassed him and circled around the pair from behind, blending into the shadows as if she were nothing but a shade herself. Only Xander’s demonic eyes spotted her, and she was more than sure that she was the only one who saw him as well.

She gave a nod and dove in for the kill, setting her sights on the man of the pair. Xander was only a second behind her after the woman. Fangs bared, they descended…

…And both halted simultaneously.

Almost as if on cue, the quarreling pair pulled crosses from their jacket pockets, baring them before the vampires.

Xander hissed and covered his eyes, tripping back over his own feet as he scrambled away from them. “Demon hunters!” he called out to Buffy in alarm.

Buffy winced at the sight of the cross before her and took a step back. The cross felt like a burning brand in the back of her mind, fire against the backs of her eyes that made thinking nearly impossible. Little white flashes went off around her peripheral vision like a nightmare migraine from hell. She kept her cool, however, and began circling towards Xander. They could get out of this together.

The sound behind her was barely noticeable above the pain that fogged her mind. A snap of a twig. Another human behind her, heart racing with fear and anticipation. An ambush.

“Run!” she screamed to Xander, diving for the ground in a neat somersault just as the crossbow bolt struck the tree just where her heart had been.

She didn’t bother to look back to see if Xander had made it. Running through the trees at a breakneck pace, she nearly slammed into the wall before her. Only one graceful leap at the last second landed her on the top of the stone wall.

She did pause for a moment, then, to listen for signs of pursuit. Nothing coming her way, although she could hear the humans off in the distance arguing about how to improve their ambush strategy. Apparently the Hellmouth bred not only psychotic vampires, but foolishly brave humans with a death wish as well.

Buffy breathed an unnecessary sigh of relief and stretched her senses out to find Xander. She’d just about given him up for dust and vanished over the wall into the cemetery behind her, when a dark, silent shape moved through the bushes below her.

“Xander!” Buffy whispered in relief as the summer winds brought his frightened scent to her.

He looked up in relief. “That was too close.” He leapt up beside her, and they fled together into the cemetery.

She nodded. “You have a lot of problems with demon hunters?” she inquired. She, personally, hadn’t dealt with many before. They tended to work around large, stable clans. She, Spike, and Dru had been on the road most of the time and therefore impossible to track by the more foolhardy elements of the human population.

Xander sighed. “Expect a couple of attacks a week,” he provided wearily. Just an every night occurrence for him.

“No, really,” Buffy insisted in disbelief. No change in Xander’s solemn expression. “Jeez,” she exclaimed, “I can see why Willow was so hot to have Spike back in town.”

“That’s Willow for you,” Xander agreed, his voice cold. “Always the clever one. Plotting around behind everyone’s backs…”

“Careful who you say that to,” Buffy advised. “She’s got ears everywhere.”

Xander studied her carefully. “You don’t like Willow any more than I do,” he shot back. “That witch is good at making enemies.”

The anger in the word ‘witch’ put Buffy off. Willow wasn’t her favorite vampire, to be sure, but she’d never felt this much resentment for the redhead. Maybe she would’ve if she’d been living in Sunnydale all these years…

“You can’t know what it’s like,” Xander was ranting in frustration now. “She’s completely out of her mind! And she has so much power…” He shuddered, even though he was unable to feel the bite in the night air. This chill was deeper than any shift of the weather, in any case. “She made Cordy be her mate,” he stated matter-of-factly. “I know it. Cordy won’t oppose her. No one will. They’re all too frightened.”

Buffy took in this all with some curiosity. A few hours back in Willow’s presence had told her that the vampiress’ domineering ways hadn’t abated in the slightest. It was strange – and dangerous – to hear these words from a vampire under her thumb, however. Even more perplexing that Xander was saying them to a virtual stranger…

“Life’s a bitch,” Buffy went for nonchalance. “So is Willow. I guess you learn to live with it.” Xander could try to kill Willow, of course, but Buffy was sure even Xander could sense that he wasn’t strong enough to win.

“That, or someone gets rid of her,” Xander echoed Buffy’s thoughts.

Buffy’s eyes narrowed suspiciously at that. There was a hopeful gleam in his eyes that made her nervous. “Why are you telling me all this?” she demanded warily. “For all you know, I’ll blab it back to Willow, and you’ll get the punishment of an unlifetime.”

He studied her quietly for a minute, his entirely body gone eerily still. There was a cold calculation in his eyes that unnerved her. “Our situations aren’t that different,” he finally answered.

“Oh?” Buffy took a step closer and looked right into his eyes, openly challenging him to back that statement up.

“You’ve been back less than a day, and already I’ve seen the way you look at Spike. At Dru. At the two of them when they’re together and you’re not invited,” he taunted lightly.

Buffy felt her demon tickling at the back of her neck, begging to be released. She held it in check with half a century’s worth of willpower. “I could say the same thing about you with Cordy and Willow,” she retorted.

Xander’s demon did slip free then, eyes yellowing and face bones shifting. He flashed his fangs but managed to keep from attacking. “Cordy’s only with Willow because she’s not strong enough to break free,” he insisted stubbornly. 

It sounded to Buffy’s ears like the same way the fanatical cling to their delusions. Probably best not to debate the point.

“You have to know Spike would take you as his mate, if Dru dropped out of the picture,” Xander pressed.

Buffy frowned at that. It was true enough. Spike loved her, just as he loved Dru. “If Spike and Dru hadn’t already been mates when I was turned, I don’t think he could’ve chosen between us,” Buffy countered. “Cordy had the choice.”

One clawed hand moved to strike her. She was faster. She caught Xander’s wrist in a brutal grip and used his momentum to send him careening to the ground.

He scrambled up to his knees and snarled. Buffy poised to defend herself once more, and the conviction in her eyes said only too clearly that this time he wouldn’t get off with just a warning. It seemed to sober Xander, and he smiled, demon receding once more.

“I can smell your power,” he informed her, delighted.

Buffy took a careful step back and kept her eyes on him. “Yeah, me, too,” she retorted flippantly. “Big whoop.”

“You could defeat Willow.” Xander said it with certainty; Buffy was less sure. If it ever did come down to that, it’d be a close battle.

“Maybe,” she conceded. “Although I hate to break it to you, but I’m skipping town with Spike and Dru once Willow takes the Hellmouth.”

“If Willow dies—” he began.

“Unlikely,” Buffy cut him off. “I’m not even sure I can beat her. Not to mention the fact that this is none of my business. Hell, if you want someone to off Wills for you so badly, why not ask Spike or Dru? It’d be a piece of cake for them.”

“I can’t offer either of them anything they want,” Xander countered.

Buffy frowned at that. “And you can offer me…what? The Hellmouth? I don’t want it. Frankly, I want to be away from here as fast as possible.”

“My eternal gratitude?” Xander teased, a seductive smile curving his lips. He circled Buffy again, still predatory but this time in a blatantly sexual way. A shiver of anticipation ran down her spine when he brushed his hard body against her.

“I’m strong enough to make you play with me any time I want,” Buffy countered. Not that she particularly wanted to force Xander; it was just a simple statement of fact.

And it was taken as such, rather than as a threat. He backed off to sit back on one of the tombstones. How ironic would Father Michael Connelly have found it that two vampires were debating sex and death right over his final resting-place?

“Willow wants you,” Xander informed Buffy. “She’s hoping to use this time to worm you under her thumb, turn you into a nice little minion like all the rest of us.”

That didn’t surprise Buffy, but it still made her skin crawl. “Spike won’t let her. Hell, neither will Dru. She’s very big on family.”

“But she considers Willow family, too,” Xander pointed out. “And she has to know that you’re going to make trouble for her sooner or later. You’re what? Less than fifty? And already you feel like a Master.”

Buffy bit her lip at that. The day of their final confrontation was close; she could feel it. Even more so now that she was back on the Hellmouth. What on earth did it do, make vampires stronger or crazier? Perhaps a bit of both…

“Dru and I are…friends.” The word sounded awkward on her lips, given her certain intention to challenge the vampiress someday.

“Really?” Xander countered. “Because I’ve never heard you call her anything but ‘grandsire’.” 

The implications hung clearly between them. It would have been the greatest sign of affection Buffy could show her elder if she were to call her ‘sire’ as she did with Spike. It would also be a subtle promise that Buffy accepted that Spike and Dru were mates. For that very reason, she was careful never to have used the term…

Xander sensed that he’s struck a nerve and moved in for the kill. “Help me,” he whispered right in her ear, “and I’ll help you. Together we can take out both Willow and Drusilla. You’ll have your sire, and I’ll have mine.”

Yes! Her demon was practically screaming in the back of her mind. You’ve waited for too long, watched them for too long, wanted for too long… But Buffy hadn’t been slave to her demon for a long time. “And if we fail?” she retorted.

“We have each other.” Xander’s knuckles stroked the side of her face.

Buffy was startled and somewhat horrified to realize she’d changed into game face without even realizing it. She quickly shifted back, chiding herself inwardly. She was supposed to have better control than that. But the idea of having Spike all to herself was so tantalizing…

“You’re the consolation prize?” she snapped sarcastically instead.

Xander shrugged at that and retreated to his tombstone once more. “You can’t tell me you’re not curious. You’ve seen them together. You know it’s different when two mates fuck.”

Haunting memories of hours spent watching Spike and Dru locked together flashed through her mind. There was a power there, an intensity, that she couldn’t even grasp. Somehow, she knew that she never would understand until she experienced it for herself. And that portion of her mind where her demon and human halves blended in perfect harmony wanted to feel that bliss more than anything else in the world.

“It’s different,” she agreed. “Better.”

Xander nodded. “I just want that with my sire.”

“So do I,” Buffy admitted, feeling somewhat breathless at the thought.

“Do we have a deal, then?” Xander grinned, looking hopeful and eager and very, very young.

Buffy hesitated and bit her lip…

“Mommy wondered where her little chickadees had run off to.” Willow’s seemingly innocent voice put an abrupt halt to their discussion.

“We were so worried,” Drusilla agreed, appearing from the stand of trees beside Willow. “Nasty hunters with their crosses are out tonight.”

Xander nodded, addressing Willow. “We ran into the group that got Lawrence last week,” he provided. “We barely got away.” Apparently, he was thoroughly convinced that the two vampiresses hadn’t heard anything they shouldn’t have. Buffy wished she felt that confidently about it.

“My poor, poor childe,” Willow cooed, sliding her arms up over his shoulder and grinding against him. Her tongue flicked out to trace his cheekbone. “We missed you this morning, my boy.”

“My apologies, sire,” he said subserviently. “Our guest was hungry.”

Buffy tried not to show her surprise at hearing Xander address Willow like that, especially after their little discussion. Apparently, greater degrees of duplicity were necessary around Willow. It was almost enough to make her decide to screw Xander’s plan and flee from this place with her family as fast as possible. Unfortunately, that wouldn’t be happening soon enough.

“Come, childe,” Willow cooed to Xander. “Cordy and I want to play. Rough.” A little giggle escaped her too-red lips.

Buffy saw something like fear cross Xander’s face before he turned and followed Willow obediently.

Drusilla tisked lightly as she watched them go. “Such chaos…” She turned back to Buffy and nuzzled her throat. “Our William is still asleep. No playing for us.” She pouted.

“Uh-huh.” Buffy managed a small smile, but couldn’t make herself return Dru’s caresses.

The madness seemed to recede from Dru’s eyes for a minute, and that eerie clarity and intelligence shone through, perfect and beautiful. It always astonished Buffy to see her grandsire like this, and these were the moments when she best understood why Spike loved this woman so deeply.

“There are things you have never seen, childe,” Drusilla said calmly, naturally, as if she were always this way. “Ways of keeping an errant and dangerous childe down. Starvation, imprisonment, bleeding, punishment…” She sighed. “So many ways.”

Buffy gulped. Dru’s vague descriptions left just enough to the imagination that her mind was already scrambling for the worst tortures possible.

“They can be kept up for years,” Dru informed her, leaning in close. “And, no matter how powerful a vampire would’ve become, they’ll never grow much beyond a fledgling. Forced to be weak and subservient forever. Of course, it drives most vampires half mad…” She trailed off, shrugged, and walked away, just expecting Buffy to follow after.

Buffy did so, almost convinced she could hear her heart pounding in her chest. It was the first real threat Drusilla had ever given her. Almost like the vampiress knew what she and Xander were planning…

And, at the thought of Xander, Buffy frowned again. She hadn’t been able to understand Xander’s weakness, his lack of control, his mercurial moods. Had that been what Drusilla was telling her? What had been happening to Xander while they were gone, and thus why he shouldn’t be trusted?

Drusilla looked back over her shoulder and held out once graceful hand to Buffy. Buffy clutched her elder’s fingers in hers, but Dru’s enigmatic smile told her nothing. Threat, information, neither, or both.

Buffy was really starting to remember why she hated the Hellmouth so much…