| 2105…
The glass shattered with the impact, and Buffy tumbled out onto the
front lawn, arms shielding her face from the razor-sharp shards. Her face
twisted into its demonic features in a snarl, and she stood once more to
face her foe.
The slayer leapt through the empty window frame gracefully, instantly
in perfect fighting stance once more.
“Watcher teach you a bit too well?” Buffy taunted, feinting with a high
kick and then connecting with a punch to the gut. The slayer doubled over
in pain, and Buffy’s heel clipped her neatly under the jaw, sending the
other brunette sprawling backward onto the grass. “Quick tip: It’s not
about mastering the moves,” Buffy continued haughtily. “It’s about adaptability,
creativity, downright innovation at times.”
“And you’re one to judge?” The slayer wiped the trickle of blood from
her mouth angrily.
“Ooh, you’re making my stomach rumble,” Buffy rolled her eyes in disdain.
“You think I’m afraid of the biggest failure in slayer history?” the
human retorted.
Buffy growled at that and lashed out. The slayer was ready, however,
and caught her ankle. The momentum of Buffy’s kick went into the throw,
and the vampiress crashed into the side of the house in an impact powerful
enough that her bones rattled. Her eyes opened again just in time to catch
the slayer’s stake three inches from her chest. Slowly, a wicked smile
curved her lips.
“Is that what they’re teaching you?” she taunted, using her full strength
to throw the girl back off of her. “That I failed?” She shook her head.
“News flash: You’ll be dead in a couple of years, even if I don’t kill
you tonight. Just like all the other poor, hapless little girls the watchers
sink their claws into. Did it ever occur to you that I’m the only slayer
who ever succeeded, because I’m the one who beat the odds?”
The human’s eyes narrowed to slits. “You’ve betrayed everything the
calling stands for,” she hissed. She lunged, kicked, missed, pulled back
and circled once again.
Buffy rolled her eyes in a bored manner. “‘The calling’?” she repeated
in disbelief. “Please, don’t tell me they’re still feeding you that
crap. ‘Cause, hello? Five thousand years of slayers and still not even
a dent in the demon population.”
“There’ll be one less.” The slayer retrieved her stake from the
debris and brandished it menacingly.
“Struck a nerve?” Buffy retorted, ducking two swipes. “Or maybe you’re
just pissed because deep inside you want it.” Her voice lowered to a seductive
whisper. “I didn’t figure it polite to mention, but I can smell your arousal.”
The other girl screamed angrily and rushed at her in a foolhardy gesture.
Buffy ducked and tripped her as she ran by, sending the other girl sprawling
on her face. Instantly, she was upon the slayer’s back, fangs just inches
from her throbbing jugular. “Hey, it’s all right. I swing both ways, y’know.”
She closed in for the kill and…
“Ahh!” She scrambled back with a screech, clutching the scalding flesh
of her arm. She stared down at the black charred cross mark there, looked
up just in time to get a foot in the face.
“I don’t think so,” the slayer hissed, stake raised.
Buffy scrambled for her footing, cradling her arm as she prepared to
go another round.
“Plannin’ on taking on two, then?” Spike’s voice cut through the night,
causing the slayer to whirl about in surprise.
Buffy had her opening but didn’t take it, choosing instead to glare
at Spike for interrupting the kill of her life.
The slayer gulped. She’d seen plenty of pictures of Spike, digitally
altered in dozens of ways to account for changes in style over the centuries.
The short-cropped black hair didn’t fool her for an instant, even though
he’d been a platinum blond in his last known photo. Although she had imagined
that he’d be…taller.
Still, shit, she didn’t know if she could take them both. But Kennedy
would try to the death. Because that was how good she was. She raised her
chin proudly, took a step toward him, stake raised…
“Girl knows her vamps,” Spike informed Buffy casually, seemingly completely
unconcerned by the approaching slayer.
“She recognized me, too,” Buffy provided. She was still angry she wouldn’t
get this kill for herself, but she grudgingly admitted it would’ve been
a hard fight with the injuries to her arm. Not that she didn’t enjoy a
hard fight…
“Knows she’s outmatched then, yeah?” Spike fixed the slayer with a midnight
blue gaze. “But she’ll fight to the death like a good little trooper, won’t
you, luv?”
“I’m not your ‘luv’,” Kennedy snapped angrily.
“Oh ho,” Spike chuckled, “a temper. Doesn’t seem to fancy me, either.
That’s a new one.”
“She wants me,” Buffy retorted smugly.
Spike gulped at the image, adjusting his jeans in a gesture that disgusted
Kennedy. “Hate to miss that,” he practically whispered.
Kennedy held the cross out in Buffy’s direction and kept the stake trained
on him.
Spike gave Buffy a barely perceptible nod, but she understood it and
slipped back off into the night grudgingly, without the slayer’s notice.
“Tell you what,” Spike commented casually. “You go back on your merry huntin’
way, and we’ll tangle another day.” He frowned, repeating that sentence
in his head. “Bloody poetry, never leaves me alone,” he grumbled under
his breath, turning his back on Kennedy and leaping over the garden wall.
She blinked in surprise at his abrupt departure before running to where
he’d disappeared, stretching her slayer senses out. Both vampires were
gone. But not for long, Kennedy was willing to bet…
* * *
“No slayer blood tonight?” Buffy asked, somewhat surprised when Spike’s
arm slipped about her waist from behind.
“’m not fool enough to take your kill, luv,” he murmured against her
ear.
“I didn’t need your help,” she insisted sullenly.
“Know that.” He twisted her earlobe between his teeth.
“That tickles,” Buffy protest with a giggle when he breathed against
the back of her neck, stirring the shoulder-length brown hairs there.
“Know what else tickles?” he teased.
She glowered at him over her shoulder, giving his butt a warning swat.
“I still haven’t fed tonight,” she complained, pulling free of his arms.
“I need to go get someone to eat.”
He pouted at that, jutting his lower lip out in that manner he knew
reminded her of a kicked puppy-dog. “Could eat in tonight,” he suggested
hopefully.
Buffy could smell the fresh blood flowing through his veins. He’d made
at least two kills that night. “Plenty to share,” she purred in agreement,
pushing him back until he sat on the end of the bed and then straddling
his waist. Her fingers trailed through short black curls, savored his purr
of anticipation, before tilting his head to one side and sinking her fangs
slowly in.
He moaned as she gripped him harder, plunged even deeper within his
flesh. His hands clutched at her waist with bruising intensity, rocking
her hips in time with her sucks, grinding their sexes together roughly.
She felt him shudder beneath her at the last pull of blood. He hadn’t
come in the traditional sense, but another sort of orgasm had shaken through
his body. Her fangs retracted, and her tongue lapped at the marks on his
neck, cleaning off the blood while they healed. She felt a brief moment
of sadness that she’d never be able to mark him permanently – only sire
and mate marks lingered – but she’d come to accept that over the past century.
She already had more of her sire than most childer were ever granted, and
she could never complain about the sincerity of his affections…
“I could’ve finished her off tonight,” she commented aloud, turning
back to the night at hand.
“Mmm?” he murmured in lazy contentment.
“The slayer,” Buffy clarified. “I almost had her.” She thought back
to the moment she’d had the girl pinned to the ground, right before the
cross had burned her arm.
Spike was apparently remembering the same moment because he pulled back
to check on her wound. Filled with his blood, the flesh on her arm wove
together over the burn, fading it from memory. He placed a soft kiss against
the inside of her elbow nonetheless. “Prob’ly couldn’t’ve passed up an
openin’ as good as that myself,” he conceded.
She frowned. “You don’t think I would’ve beaten her?” she demanded,
a little offended.
“I think you were gettin’ to her,” he corrected. “Tough to judge until
just the right moment whether or today is your one good day. But no reason
not to let her simmer just a bit, let that death wish come through nice’n’loud.”
He caught her waist and pulled her back onto the bed beside him.
“You just wanna get laid,” she accused him petulantly.
He flashed her a rakish grin. “Got it in one, luv,” he agreed, rolling
her beneath him and stripping her as he went.
Her own hand pushed away at his leather jacket, opened his shirt wide,
and fumbled at the fastenings of his pants. Hasty fingers a little too
eager to find bare flesh. But when she finally held him in her hands, guided
him up into her womb, it made it all worthwhile. She moaned as he moved
within her, pressed her lips to his, and thought that she could live like
this forever.
And then she wasn’t able to think at all as the pleasure overcame them…
* * *
Drusilla lay back, contented and sated, watching the two fledglings
get each other off. The blond currently had the brunet’s cock up his ass
and was writhing in ecstasy as the elder fledgling gave him a hand-job
in time to his thrusts. Drusilla touched herself languidly and egged them
on, hoping the brunet would go so deep he’d rupture something within the
blond. That extra scent of blood and pain that made everything twice as
exciting…
She’d had both pretty boys earlier, in every position she could think
of, and her body ached pleasantly. They hadn’t been as good as her beautiful
childer, of course.
Dru had noticed her thoughts drifting back to her two lovers over the
past
week. It had been almost three months since she’d seen them last, now.
Just enough time for her immortal companions to seem new and exciting once
more.
She missed them, in truth. Missed the barbed words, the growls and whimpers,
the bright red sprays of blood and the two very bitable asses. And, of
course, the little green fireflies that flitted about their heads. Trails
of luminescence so much brighter than the others, spelling out in ancient
runes that their fates were bound to hers in an intricate tapestry. That
they were hers.
These two were hers, too, in a way. She watched the blond come, the
brunet on his heels – although not literally. Now that would’ve
been interesting. But, yes, these two were hers. She told them when to
feed, when to fuck, when to come. They would pleasure her until starvation
drove them mad, if she asked.
But their destinies were brief flickers, so she paid them little mind
even as they curled up on either side of her.
“Shall we pleasure you again, mistress?”
So eager to please. She appreciated that at the moment. “Blankets and
bedclothes, aaall wrapped up for the night.”
The blond gave the brunet a confused look.
“I think that means no…”
“Cupie, cupie!” Drusilla clapped in merriment. So fun to tease these
simple minds. Watch their fear and confusion. Her Spike and her Buffy would’ve
figured out her little game by now, but not these two. Oh, she could play
with them long and hard and…
A gasp escaped her lips, and she jolted upright as a dark tremor rumbled
through her consciousness. Like something had sunk its claws into the back
of her mind, snapped a piece of her up, and severed the tangled thread
that had bound it to her.
“What was that?” the brunet shivered, hand seeking the other
male’s instinctively.
Not a vision or one of her delusions, then. If the others could sense
it, this was something much more visceral. “Clouds of shimmering gold dust,”
she thought aloud. “Ages reduced to whispers and, at the center of it all,
a deep, black void…”
“What’s she talking about?” the blond asked nervously.
The brunet gulped. “It’s sort of like how it felt when my sire dusted,”
he offered.
“Seriously?” The blond sounded curious.
“Except less…powerful,” the brunet nodded. “Whose sire must that
have been to feel…” he gulped, “like that?”
“The Golden Order has lost its king,” Drusilla informed them, tiring
of their prattling, “and the Violet Persian its queen, I think…”
“This that war we’ve been hearing about?” the blond ventured. “The big
cheese duking it out?”
Dru sighed. She didn’t have time for these two right now. A coy smile
on her lips, she beckoned them each inward with a crooked white nail. “Mommy
has a little secret to share,” she sing-songed.
They both leaned in hopefully…
“Tonight is you last night.”
…And screamed in horror as their hearts were ripped from their chests,
crushed to dust.
Drusilla watched them crumble, saw the blood trickle down her hands,
and regretted the momentary loss of pleasure. But darkness itself was swirling
into motion now, and the fewer unworthy aware of it, the better.
Her companions had been pleasure; this was family. And, as Drusilla
dressed and prepared to meet her summons, she reminded herself that family
always came first…
* * *
“Your sacred duty always comes first.”
Kennedy nodded vigorously, reading the tome over her watcher’s shoulder.
“This fallen slayer’s watcher betrayed everything we stand for,” he
continued to lecture in clear, precise British tones. “Not only did he
fail to destroy the demon that took hold of his charge’s body, but he lied
about her continued threat. Severe punishment would have been dealt out
had Buffy’s continued existence been discovered while Rupert Giles still
lived.”
“No one to take the blame.” Kennedy’s eyes narrowed. “He was a coward.”
“Quite. But we can do our best to remedy the situation.”
“I’m taking that California bitch out?”
“Colorful but accurate,” he agreed. “It is of primary importance that
we dispose of this vampire, especially if she already fights as a Master.”
Kennedy rubbed her sore back tenderly. “She does.”
“Then, this,” he pointed at the picture of Buffy – blonde and smiling
happily – violently, “is your mission. All else is secondary. The Council
will provide you with whatever means are necessary until—”
“Either she’s dead, or I am.”
“Indeed.”
Kennedy just grinned smugly. “Then, let the best slayer win…”
* * *
“Mmm,” Buffy sighed, rolling over lazily in bed, “did you feel a shiver?”
“Some big-wig kicked it last night,” Spike mumbled, breathing in the
floral scent of her hair and snuggling back into sleep. “Nothin’ to fuss
ourselves about.”
“’k, then,” she agreed happily enough, wrapping herself up in his body.
She’d woken up too well to fall back asleep again, though, even with her
sire’s nude body as a full-length pillow. “Whatcha wanna do today?” she
asked lightly, trailing her fingers up and down his chest.
He grunted and rolled over, trying to fall back asleep.
Buffy nibbled lightly on his shoulder. “Mmm…sire… Don’t see why I’d
want to taste slayer at all when I can have you.” She licked a line across
his shoulder blade.
He sighed at that. “You deserve it,” he answered simply.
Buffy sighed. “I don’t care about that,” she insisted, nuzzling him
fondly. “I care about you.”
“And ‘s getting you blacklisted by the Order,” he retorted.
Her fingers played across his chest lightly, taking a moment to savor
his presence and consider the growing argument between them. Basically,
the fact that she hadn’t been ‘officially’ named a Master of the Order
of Aurelius, even though she blatantly obviously was a master vampire
by now. The reason she was being looked over was even more obvious: Spike
had done more than his fair share of pissing off their entire extended
family over the centuries, and they were getting their revenge on him by
shunning his childe.
Frankly, Buffy didn’t care about titles and such. Spike hadn’t ever
seemed to, either, except for this. A bit of that old Victorian chivalry
that railed against her being insulted for his crimes. And Buffy could
certainly understand why he was pissed.
“I’d rather spend eternity by your side,” she whispered fervently against
his chest, “than leave you just so the Order will give me a pat on the
head.”
He smiled, despite himself. “Have I mentioned lately you’re the light
of my unlife?”
She smiled down at him. “You could always show me. Repeatedly.”
He purred at that. “Where are the scarves?”
“You’re tying me up?” she teased lightly, sitting up to reach into their
drawer of toys.
“No,” he countered seductively, “you’re tyin’ me up.”
A possessive growl rumbled through her chest. Oh, she loved when he
lay himself completely at her mercy, the trust and adoration in his eyes,
all the time in the world given her to make him scream his throat raw with
pleasure…
She reached for the drawer…and frowned. “What’s this?” she asked, puzzled
at the envelope lying atop the mahogany shelf.
She reached for it curiously, entranced by its beauty. She’d never seen
an envelope like this before. It was perfectly black, almost as if the
darkest felt had been made paper-thin. It felt like parchment, though,
framed with a thin gold trim. Somehow, Buffy wasn’t surprised to feel that
the leaf was real gold.
“What’s what?” Spike inquired, rolling over to see what she was so interested
in. He spotted the envelope, and instantly his eyes widened in alarm. “Oh
no…” he murmured in practically a whisper.
“Did you put this here?” Buffy inquired. “It’s beaut—” She froze mid-sentence
at the look of shock on his face. “Spike?” she asked, concerned.
“Give it here, luv,” he whispered hoarsely, holding out his hand shakily.
Buffy frowned and handed it over. “I’m not going to damage it or—”
“They put it there,” he answered her previous question belatedly.
She blinked slowly. “They?” She was starting to get a bit frightened
by the way he was acting. She’d never seen him this nervous before. “Spike,
what’s going on?” she demanded more sternly this time.
He sighed, the shock apparently wearing slowly off. “Got myself a summons,
luv,” he replied, sounding not at all enthusiastic. Opening the envelope,
he pulled out the sheet of paper inside, a sheet as dark ebony as the envelope.
Buffy leaned in closer when she saw the glint of letters in the candlelight.
Apparently, the text had been written in gold ink.
“Must be ‘cause of the big dusting last night…” he sighed, handing the
letter over to her so she could read it to him. A pity vampire vision hadn’t
done a thing for those reading glasses he needed, and he wasn’t about to
squint from a few feet away at something this important.
Buffy shivered at his words. They meant that whoever had planted the
letter had placed it in their room last night. For some reason, the thought
of someone sneaking through their bedroom while they slept in each other’s
arms gave her chills. Like their intimacy had been violated by an outsider.
Buffy refused to even consider the possibility that the messenger had snuck
in while they were making love…
“Invasive bastards, aren’t they?” Spike echoed her thoughts.
Buffy nodded and read aloud, tilting the paper just right so the gold
glinted in the candlelight and made the words come alive. “‘William Arthur
Barrington’,” she looked up at him in surprise at only the second time
she’d seen his full name.
“Know everythin’, too,” he sighed.
“‘Your presence is required at The Haven. We’ll expect you in three
days’ time.’” She frowned at the signature, suddenly realizing why he’d
reacted so strongly to the distinctive stationary. “‘Signed, The Golden
Order’.”
“Bugger,” he swore vehemently in response. |
