Taken By the Night
Part Nine

Chapter IX the reasons

Big red, cinnamon gum. I used to like those a lot…when I was still human. I liked Sprite and Friday’s. Daddy took me to Friday’s once a month when I was seven, during my Dorothy Hamil phase. Those were the days.

“You look lost in thought, Mistress.”

Willow, remember when you first met me? All those funny nights when we would do the round robin? Remember the time about the Inca mummy and you dressed like an Eskimo? Boy, I like how you looked at Oz then, you were all hopes and sweetness.

“I am—tell me, Will. What are we gonna do about Doyle and Cordelia getting married. It’s contra bloody dark natura! Sure he is a demon, and she is closer to ‘the bitch from hell’ than the average slut… but marriage?! And he wants Angelus to be the best man! I don’t get it.” He left a package of Big Red on Cordelia’s desk, which I was fingering presently.

“We could kill them—or we could just kill ‘one’ of them.” I laughed. It seemed practical all right but it was either the head of protocol or the man behind my husband’s security… tough choice.

“Let them be—they’ll be divorced in a few years—I am very sure they won’t handle intimacy well.” I knew for a fact they fought very much, but also loved each other. I had secret hopes in them, but after all, most marriages ended in divorce over the first year, especially inter-racial, or in this case, inter-species.

“Oz said he would be going with you to Sunnydale, is that true?”

I am sure you are wondering what would I have to do there. Truth is I am going to give Giles the Aurelia’s manuscript. It needs translation and I can’t understand most of it.

“Business. Some friends need to be reminded of my presence.” I said it with as much wickedness as I could muster, already considering the carnage Willow, Spike and Drusilla would have liked.

“I’d love to go with you.”

I am sure you would! You are practically drooling, but I am worried about them, about Miss Calendar—I mean Mrs. Giles—and their baby, and the apocalypse Faith was ranting about the last time she came here. I would not want them to be in danger over something that used to be my responsibility.

“You must stay, and watch this twisted wedding off.” It was going to happen the Saturday before Thanksgiving. I had already decided to drop by my old house and see how Joyce and Ethan Rayne were doing. I still couldn’t understand why my mother had fallen in love with the warlock, he was evil, but even that served a purpose.

“Maybe I’ll have a party favor after all.”

The purpose of keeping the façade of evil and simultaneously keeping her safe. Quite a juggler’s act! Me pretending to be the worst piece of shit and saving people from my own friends at the same time!

“Be careful, Will. You know how it would become after all those demons get under one tiny tent…and mingle with people like Harmony.” Carnage! Mayhem! Destruction! Death! To them it was all fun and big time. I wasn’t in the state of mind to bear it now. Not after my dreams.

“Mmm, Harmony. Yummy Harmony that is. I’ll be careful, I will make sure the bridesmaids are taken care of before you return. What should I tell my sire about your whereabouts?” Her sire was Spike. A sore thorn on my side that was. After Angelus had taken the girl to be one of his servants, for me!, he went behind his back and turned her! I had to act all happy and reward him…when in truth I wanted to kill him, and slowly at that point of rage. Willow had been my only true friend…and now because of him, she was a demon.

“The usual…that I’m gone and I will be back whenever I deem it fit to do so, and throw bloody hell in the middle of it for extra pun.” She hated him, I hated him, even Angelus hated him, but you know what happens in vampire world: /vampires don’t settle old scores, we harbor them/

Boy that Anne Rice sure knows vampires!

“Yes, mistress. And…be careful too. Master Angelus would be very angry if something happens to you.”

Nothing will happen to me, Will. It’s a fast trip. Go in, give the book, see mom, see Jenny, see Hellmouth, be gone back home again. See? Very short trip.

“I would make sure your mate stays out of danger too.” God, even without a soul she still loved Oz. I could see it reflected in her eyes, I could smell the essence of him in her. Rrr, be done with that, Love. It’s disturbing me.

Angelus got jealous when I would even consider the existence of other males in the building. When he was in my head he always seem to fill me with his thoughts…and growls. He knew they made me horny.

You know I only have eyes for you.

And very beautiful eyes they are, my Beloved.

I smiled for the compliment and turned to listen to his conversation as I walked towards his office.

“The Mohra people salute you master Angelus. We have come to attend the ceremony of the beheading of the…”

I closed the link considering it a very grim conversation to be hearing and turned upstairs to our quarters. My bags were already packed and I would leave as soon as Oz would come back from his regular errands.

Don’t leave yet. They’ll be gone in a little while and I’ll go upstairs and make love to you before dinner.

Dinner. That reminded me I was starving.

Yummy. I’ll take a bath then. Be quick with the Mohras then.

I will.

Two words could held all the promise in the world. Something like I do or My Beloved. It was very clear how enamored of the man I was. And then there was something else. Beyond the bond and the sex and the caring…something bone deep, a dependence and a sensitivity towards him, something unforeseen that had develop there among us, friendship of the minds and bodies and happiness, inner joy that came every time I shared a look with him.

It hadn’t been there at first. I knew he was a beast, a vampire and soulless one to add to the matter, but still he looked at me with such passion. He made me weak in the knees, and breathless, like falling into nothing, no wonder falling in love was such a common phrase.

I realize now he could have mesmerized me very easily, but when I looked into his eyes there was depth, a feeling he was showing me, need, pure animal, sexual and emotionally raw need. I could understand that look now, but not then.

He was baring his heart to me when he wasn’t speaking. He sought guile in me and when he found none, he trusted in his own malice. Not because he wanted to hurt me, but because he wanted me, with painful ardor. I could now see he was crazy for me, but at that time there was fear and foolishness clouding my mind.

I never struggled his hold on me, because I knew I couldn’t lie about the way he made me feel. He should have smelled the fear and lust in my body, the love mingled with betray and confusion, the residual of Angel and finally the attachment to my life.

A lonely, burdened existence, filled with responsibility and pain. Always somebody else’s needs and feelings above my own, always a day to save the world, to kill vampires, to study weapons, to not have dates, to copy homework I could have done on my own, to see others have a life while I kept saving it for them without receiving a simple thank you so much in return…

And the lonely nights in the bed, when I knew others had sleep, dreams and futures to plan, and to know I would have nothing of those, broke my heart.

My mother with her naiveté, my father with his coldness, my watcher with his eagerness, my friends with their happiness and my life so lonely to compare with theirs.

Yes, I was alone in the end. Alone until Angel came. He was a solace, a dream I cherished in my heart, a reason to have joy in my life…at least until the Judge, until that night I met destiny in the face.

He had been cold and brutal, animal to the extent of pain, but he was real. Truth to his words and acts, he had been a curse at first. A snake biting my proverbial ankle for my weakness in the art of love and seduction. Yes, I have nothing but hate for Angelus at first.

Hate that turned into passion and love with time. It took a while to understand him and my feelings for him, but I managed it and in that time he fell in love with me, and I could have not imagine then the type of love he had in mind.

And all that fell sideways in my path. I walked alone then, but I didn’t know it. Now I walked with a hand that is mine, to hold and to care for, whether I had wanted it at first or not.

I guess that was my reason. Loneliness. And that is a very powerful reason, as powerful as love. He took my hand in his and held on and I wasn’t alone anymore after that.

He was there to carry half my burden, to protect me when my mind was elsewhere, to make love to me and my body, to hear me laugh and cry, to share my dreams and watch my sleep. And in the end just to have me. And I simply couldn’t put a price on that.

And I still can’t.

+++

THE DREAM

I lay there silent, with the need to awake from my sleep. I couldn’t move. I was dreaming and I knew it. I saw the room beneath my lashes, dim to avoid sunlight. I saw him, lying next me, with his arm around my buttocks. I was lying face down, to his right. His face was an inch away from mine. His eyelashes were brushing his high cheekbones, his mouth curved in a half smile, his breath warm in my face. I knew we were both dreaming by then. It was common to share our dreams and sometimes it felt almost like real life…almost.

We were both alive in this dream, warm, fleshy, smelly, and loudly human. As human as you and me and the next person reading this lines. I was hungry I realized, my stomach made churning sounds like the regular human bowels do. I could taste food in my mouth…sweet chocolate ice cream and peanuts. I could hear and see the constant beating of my own heart inside my chest. I could feel the need to pee, so overwhelming, so realistic, so … human.

And then there was him. My Aingeal, my mate, also smelly and real, with a growing shade of beard in his jaw line. A rise and fall to his back, a smell of masculinity and soap in his hands, a slow rivulet of saliva in the corner of his mouth, drooling. Even a soft snore to accompany the slack mouth and the flat wet hair in his nape.

I rose, as silently as I could, to make my way to the bathroom. In that motion something appears or rather disappeared from sight. My toes, and calves too, beneath a huge belly. I wonder how was it that I have been lying in my stomach when it was so big and round, but it didn’t make much difference to realize it was there to begin with.

Me, pregnant and heavy for that matter, it was incongruous to say the least. But it was real, and I still had the most plaguing urge to pee, and go back to bed. In that order. But for some reason I stopped to glance out at the window and the world was very alien, a forest, with pines and birds and rivers, not at all the city of Los Angeles. It was so weird, all so weird in this dream of mine.

And then I walked into the bathroom and sat at the toilet. After having done my business, a turkey appeared in the table next to me. A table I hadn’t seen before. Never realized it was there to begin with, but I was starving. I started to take a bite from the turkey leg to realize it was still raw, blood pouring from it. And the blood wasn’t food anymore. It actually made my nauseous, weak, so weak I couldn’t bear the sight of it, especially on top my belly.

I realized then I was naked, and the place I was inside wasn’t my bathroom anymore. It was the ocean, the Santa Monica pier to be more exact. Hundreds of strangers walked by and I felt very tempted to go into the water.

By then I felt a reassuring hand gripping mine, because the sea-line at the bottom of the view was making me cry. I wanted to reach the end and I couldn’t. I tried hard to go to it and it was swallowing me in the process.

The hand that pulled me out of it was familiar. Angelus gripping my shoulders to his back, spooning me both in dream and reality, his hand around my belly a safety belt from the water in the dream. He spoke crooning words to me, soothing things that sounded Gaelic in origin.

Alainn, mo croi.

I understood what those meant and there was more to it but I was awaking from it, and I didn’t want to. I struggled to preserve the warm of his embrace to me, only to find it empty and cold as I opened my eyes to my room in Wolfram and Heart.

Cold and alien. It all seemed unreal at times. The lack of sun, the gray dullness of the furniture and the walls, the all white bathroom and the lack of mirrors. He was there with his arm around my midriff, as safe as houses, but still the dream seemed to fade slowly off of me as I remembered that I had to go Sunnydale. It was lovely to stay and have sex all night, but I had an urge, almost like a hunch that made want to be there. As if my family or Giles truly needed me.

I didn’t stop to say goodbye or take a bath even. I just got dressed and managed to leave the room without Angelus waking up. He was so handsome in his sleep, almost childlike, almost vulnerable.

Be careful, mo Aingeal. I’ll be back soon, a gradh.

I’ll miss ye badly lass.

He was so nice in half sleep, thick in his accent as if he was speaking only to me, as if he was still a lad from Galway, and I loved him for it. He knew he could be his true self with me, no need for masks or pretenses between us.

Give ye me regards to Ripper. Tell ‘em gudluck with the new bairn from us and… may the Almighty bless ye and protect ye cailin.’

And ye too, sire.

I blew him a kiss and managed to stop laughing at his heavy accent. He was delicious at it, very fierce and guttural, and so very sweet!

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