Fic: Right of Claim 16/19

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Wordcount: 4,076

Chapter 15 – Bad Omens (Black Magic)

“Every day it seems much harder telling right from wrong
You got to read between the lines”
-Triumph – Fight the Good Fight

He slept deeply, a better sleep than he’d had since coming to this fucking hellhole of a town, until the sound of the alarm dragged him from his sleep, horrid thing that it was. He wasn’t sure that he would ever get used to these bloody hours that he was being forced to live.

Ethan opened a single eye and watched as he went about the actions of grabbing a fresh set of clothing and heading for the bathroom, stepping into another cold shower since the day was already threatening heat again.

“Car?” it asked, still refusing to move as he came back out.

“Nah, the bike; stir up a bit of a breeze. I’ll see you later.”

Slowly, still blinking tired eyes, he made his way down the stairs and into the kitchen, to have a quick cup of coffee. Groaning to himself, he narrowed his eyes at the black muck that he poured into his cup.

All that he wanted to do was crawl back into the bed, and go back to sleep for the rest of the day. He may have changed time-zones, but one look at the sunlit sky and it seemed to spark an instinctive reaction.

He drained half the cup, and pre-emptively swallowed a couple of aspirin, then drained the rest and geared up.

There was still a good half hour to go before the first bell to summon the students run, when he pulled in, and instantly found himself grateful that looks couldn’t kill as he lifted his helmet free and found himself face to face with a glare from the Slayer that was almost as effective as a sharpshooter’s bullet.

Putting the helmet down on the back of the bike, he pulled the leather jacket off and then tucked them both under one arm, offering her a smile that was probably more than a little antagonizing.

“Sleep well?”

Probably not the best move that he could have made, he amended, as she quite clearly looked like she wanted to hit him. But on the other hand, he’d spent a long time learning how to piss people off, too.

She made to storm past, but he caught up and fell into step beside her, “Sorry, bad habit and all that.”

“I don’t want to talk to you.”

Her voice was low and cold enough to freeze water. And maybe it would have been the more traditional option, to have sent her down into a vampire nest in the middle of the night, in the minutes after the boy had been taken but his consciousness wouldn’t have allowed it.

“I’m sorry about last night, too.”

She sped up.

“But like I said, it’s my job to keep you alive. And that’s something that I intend to live up to.”

He reached out a hand towards her, planning on slowing her or stopping her, and her hand swung up and collided with his with a crunch that he recognized, and he had to bite his own tongue to stop himself from saying exactly what it was that he really wanted to. Dislocated fingers weren’t new territory, but that still didn’t stop it from hurting like hell.

On the other hand, as soon as she heard that sound she froze in mid-step, and spun towards him, looking shocked, as though it wasn’t something that she had been expecting.

She looked mortified, which would have been amusing after all her attitude, if it hadn’t taken that level of pain to bring it about.

“Oh, shit. I’m… I… was that… did I…”

He tried to keep his expression reassuring, as he pushed the door of the library open with the hand that didn’t feel like it had just been run over, and she followed him in, looking extremely uncertain of herself.

“Dislocation,” gritting his teeth, he placed his hand as flat as he could force it on the top of the counter, and looked down, wincing. Two of the knuckles were back further than they should have been.

“There’s a cold compress, from the fridge in my office, if it’s not too much trouble.”

As she moved past him, careful to keep as much distance between her and him as possible he lined up the heel of his other hand with the knuckles, and shoved forward and down, hard. His mouth opened in what wanted to be a high scream, even though he managed to keep it under wraps for the most part.

Seconds later, as he blinked the darkness away from the edges of his vision, he felt the compress being rested against his hand. Still pulling a face, he pressed it against the throbbing area and closed his eyes in relief for a few seconds.

At the sound of her moving he forced them back open again and gave here a smile, abet a pained one, “So, we even now?”

Now the expression on her face seemed to be querying whether he was quite sane. To which the answer was more than likely a definitive no although she didn’t need to know that little titbit.

“Are we… even?”

“Yes, I piss you off; you knock my joints out of place. Does that make us even? And no, I’m not going to be in a hurry to do so again, although old habits do die hard as they say. And I seem to have a habit for pissing others off.”

“I… yeah, I guess. You look like you’ve done that before, too.”

He brushed past her, and grabbed out a chest of weapons that was tucked behind the door with his good hand, straightening to nudge it in her direction with the toe of his boot.

“It’s a long story; as is a lot of my life. But no, it’s not the first time that I’ve had to, although I dare say I wasn’t expecting a Slayer-related injury until after I’d started working out with you.”

She opened the trunk, and settled on a knife that was long enough to be used for decapitation if handled in the right way, and four stakes. He noticed the silver cross glinting in the light as she leaned forward, but didn’t say a word about it, even as tempted as he was to do a mirror spell over it that would show him where it came from.

“Maybe one day it’s a story you’ll tell me?” he almost didn’t catch the words, muttered to the top of his trunk as they were, before she stood back up and faced him.

Not if I can ever help it, he thought, even as he forced a smile that felt as false as a cat’s pyjamas, “Yes, perhaps.”

She tucked the last stake into a pocket, as the door opened again to let the boy and the potential witch in.

The first thing that he noticed was that they both looked haggard, in spite of his reassurances, although he didn’t blame them. It had been three weeks after he’d first been told about vampires before he slept in anything other than drips and drabs, after all.

“Yes, Rupert, everything that you’ve heard is real. They do exist, as do those other things that humanity has feared since time unknown. But people like you and I, we’re put here to help make a difference, to help tip the balance of good and evil in the favour of humanity.”

“But I wanna fly. Or have a shop all my own, like Mister Stevenson on the corner. Having a shop looks fun.”

“You’ll never have a shop. But you’ll be worth so much more than that, Rupert. People like that, they only help make life normal. But you, and what you’re going to be, you’ll help to keep the entire world turning. You’ll help keep the night separated from the day.”

When he was old enough to consider it, he’d thought it a lot of weight to place on the shoulders of a child. Once he’d known the full extent of the story, he’d wondered just how it was that his father kept his own shoulders unbowed, knowing what he had, especially after Rupert had come into his power.

“Mister Giles?” Willow’s voice was soft, hesitant like that of a shy young woman with a first date. And that was a tone that he knew; since on those rare nights off that it had given him, he’d grabbed at life with everything that he had. Dating, communication, drinking, magic, the only place that the line had been drawn was sex.

“Yes?” He smiled at her, as encouragingly as he could. And the boy’s gaze of course went to the tip of the last stake which was showing out one of Buffy’s pockets.

“I’m… I think Xander was right. I’m not entirely sure that sleeping still works, when you know what’s waiting.”

Xander spoke up before he could answer, “So, that’s what it takes; stakes? Well load me up then, Library-Man. When do we move out?”

He scowled at that. Library-Man, of all the things that he could have been dubbed; and then of course, there was the other factor, besides the hot-headed bravery of youth. The chance was there that if the boy went underground then he wouldn’t be coming back aboveground. If a vampire caught that scent and recognized it, then there were very few that recognized the boundary of age, and more than likely a fair few that would do what they wanted either for the sport of it, or to send that enthralling scent into overdrive.

He wanted to give the boy a taste of the youth that he ought to have a chance to enjoy, before circumstances ripped it from him. He wanted this young innocent to see some fragment of something that he’d never had.

“There’s no we about it at all, I’m afraid. Buffy is the Slayer, she’s the one going underground, not the two of you.”

Xander’s face fell at that, “But that’s Jessie. He’d been my best friend since I was seven. I’ve got to be a part of it; I’ve got to be there for him, when he comes back out.”

Buffy shot him a look that he found himself whole-heartedly agreeing with.

“I’m sorry, but she’ll have a better chance at getting him out if she goes on her own. If you tried to go underground, then you’d be risking your own life, as well as hurting her chances and those of your friend. If you want to help, then you’d be better off helping me here with research. I’ve recently heard mention of this affair called a Harvest that I need to look into. And even if the two of you did want to help, then there are a lot of basic facts that you’d be better off knowing first.”

She looked grateful as she slipped out.

If he could pinpoint a few basic facts, then he could always hit Ethan up later too, see if it knew anything. Which was rather likely, considering that it had been around the block a few times.

He noticed a flick of something that he didn’t quite recognize passing over the boy’s face, before he shook his head, and turned away.

“Sorry, but me and research are like two things that don’t go well together. Like… like oil and some other non-soluble thing. And if I’m going to have to have my nose in a book, then I’d rather be doing it for the grade that can get me out of here.”

Willow, on the other hand pulled out a book from the shelf-space that he’d indicated, those which held details on the older rites and rituals of the Old Ones. He didn’t wonder at the boy’s behaviour, as he thought that he understood it. His life had been turned on it’s ass with the discovery that vampires were real, so he sympathised with Xander’s desire to try and forget everything and crawl back into one of those tiny spaces that had been left by the shadows in the now empty crawl-spaces in his life.

Willow stayed, reading, until the bell went for second period, gave him a promise that she would be back after her last class, and he gave her a note to stop her from getting into trouble.

As the girl left, he was alone with his own thoughts once again. Restlessly he shifted about the library, first trying to focus on a spot of shelving, and then going back to the books when that didn’t work, as first one hour dragged by, and another followed in its footsteps.

He was just beginning to take the words in again, when the door opened and the Slayer came in, with the boy, looking even more shaken then he had done last night, at her side. Realising that he’d slipped out to go with her he felt a wash of anger at the boy’s stubbornness, which he managed to rein in as he reminded himself that the boy didn’t know why he’d told him not to. And he wasn’t planning on saying anything, because if he did then he would probably never step outside again.

“How did it go?” he asked hesitatingly, “did you find him?”

He saw the agony in the boy’s expression and knew that it was going to be one of two answers.

“We found him,” the Slayer answered, “and they found us. It was a trap; they must have turned him some time last night.”

At that he had to fight to keep the world from dissolving to that one word, digging his fingernails into the palm of his still-throbbing hand until he felt an almost-familiar sting of pain that meant he’d dug through the skin. Turned was a frighting term indeed.

“I’m sorry.”

He even meant it, as she looked at him like she wanted to yell at him some more. He could even imagine the words, a stark statement of the fact that they didn’t know exactly when he had been turned, that if she’d plunged headlong into danger when she’d wanted to last night then he may have been saved.

And still, the boy just looked miserable.

She kept to business, although he wasn’t sure who it was meant to be a reassurance to.

“So, have you turned up anything on this Harvest thingy?”

“Not yet I’m afraid, but I’ve another avenue to traverse tonight which may yet turn something up.”

“Tonight? Why the hell tonight? If this thing’s maybe time-important, then can we risk waiting? I mean, it’s not like the library’s doing a thriving trade, unless it’s with invisible people.”

“We don’t have a choice about waiting,” he bit back on his natural urge which was to snap at her, “the friend that I’m to ask keeps to his own hours. And I can’t simply walk off the job, much though I may desire it. The best thing that the two of you can do is go to class for the rest of the day. I’ll keep trudging through the books, and I’ve already enlisted your Willow to come back after her last class as well.”

The Slayer almost seemed like she was going to hang back, but at the last moment changed her mind, hurrying out of the room as the door still swung back and forth in the wake of the boy’s departure.

All that the books achieved was to give him a headache. He may as well have been trying to transfer the knowledge to himself via the method of bashing himself repeatedly over the head with one of the heavier tomes. And when the final bell rung he found himself feeling a kind of desperate gratitude as the three teenagers came back in.

He set out a couple of books that were in English, at least, and endured his Slayer’s not-quite-as-cold, yet still silent greeting as he tugged on his leather, and headed out of the school, saying only that he would be back shortly. The question was, of course, whether Ethan would be at home, resting, or whether it was exploring the underground itself.

And he knew that he could have rung, but conversations tended to go better face to face.

The bike sung to him, whispering her sweet, mindless tune as he twisted the throttle, and took a corner too low for practicality, loving that feeling of danger and freedom, and holding his own life in his own hands, in the only moment that it really seemed to be his life; his to throw away, his to thrive in the midst of and his to risk or cherish as he saw fit.

He could still remember the first time that he’d rode, the thrill of it, coupled with that temporary feeling that he was his own man again, something that he’d missed so sorely that there were moments when he ached for it. His life had started out as the Council’s, and then it had morphed to his own when he’d first hit the street. After that, of course it had become Ethan’s and now it was a strange mockery; its, as well as the Slayer’s. The bike gave him something that he’d never had a chance to take for granted.

He didn’t bother to remove anything other than the helmet, as he let himself into the house, and headed up the dark stairs, relying on senses other than sight to guide him.

It was lying on the bed, completely still, as per usual when it was on its own, and the relaxation that he could see in its body told him that it was actually sleeping, or whatever else it was that it did instead.

“Ethan.”

He raised his voice, as he kicked the leg of the bed, then took a couple of quick steps back, and the response was instantaneous as it morphed fully before it was completely awake, and when it opened its eyes he was staring at the glare of a startled predator, lip dropped back from tooth. It stared at him for a few seconds, before he watched as a slow recognition almost seemed to ease onto its face and it morphed back to human.

“I’ll assume there’s a reason that you’re waking me before sunset.”

“What do you know of the Harvest?”

He grinned at the young woman that he’d chosen out of the pathetic bunch that he’d managed to somehow draw to him, like he was a shepherd to the pathetic and needy. A few years ago he’d had both kin and servants under him, but since that spot of trouble a few years back, in London, 1666, when he’d been trying to commune with a God and had sparked off that bloody fire which had managed to take a good three quarters of his already small band with him, his luck had gone from bad to worse.

It had been Chaos in its finest moment, but now he only had three with him, which was… risky, to say the least. Dee had been with him for a few years before the fire, had come to him out of the shadows as a young woman of seventeen, terrified of the possibility of her own death at the hands of something like him.

She had asked him for protection, and in return he had taken her life and granted her one of his own doing. To have a turned Potential Slayer at his side was a sweet feeling of triumph.

She was powerful, and she seemed to radiate it. Her skin was covered in a fine mask of dust, eyes that were normally a dark brown were yellowed, and a darker spot just to the left of her mouth was blood that had dried there several days ago. He blond hair was matted in spots and looked as though it had been teased in others, and gave the illusion that she had a mane around her head. And she was shivering, a constant barely restrained energy running through her, holding her constantly on the edge.

She was good company; interesting, to say the least. It was simply a shame that the act of blooding her had driven her mad. It would be a shame to see her dead, but all of the mad succumbed eventually. He would simply have to take what he could out of it in the mean-time.

Lifting his other hand he brushed aside a few of those wild strands of hair, and met her eyes.

“Paige, you understand what I wish of you?”

“Yes. Oh, yes. The power sings it,” her voice was faint, barely a whisper, and certainly not one that a human would have heard.

He raised his hand, and bit the back of his own wrist, dipping his fingers to the blood, to trace a mark that was even older than he was, onto her forehead.

“You will help to give me back what I lost during that infernal spell. Any life that you take tonight will go to me.”

He could see, by the way that nothing changed in her gaze, that she hadn’t taken in a single word that he’d uttered, that the thought of the kill was all that she held in her pretty little head. Smiling, indulgently, he took half a step towards her, and kissed her hungrily, shoving his tongue deep into her mouth, more like he was invading than kissing, and she responded by chasing his tongue back into his mouth, as he raised a hand and toyed a single small nipple into hardness. Then one of her teeth caught him, and that hunger, that permeating thirst flooded back into her expression.

Chuckling to himself he let her go, and stepped back, releasing her.

“Go and kill my little falcon. And then come back to me.”

“Always,” her voice still didn’t raise any louder.

His grin grew more savage, as she turned her back. He was going to enjoy this. And even though it would be shame to lose her company, the vessel of power simply couldn’t survive. If she hunted and returned, as the spell that he had woven around her would urge her to do, then the only remaining outcome would be for him to end her existence permanently. After all, the transfer wasn’t complete, wasn’t permanent, until the vessel had been drained of every drop of stolen blood. And as much fun as she was to have around, she was still a liability.

He would make her second death good for her, but this time it would be a permanent one.

“Enough.”

He had seen its eyes darken with a memory, could tell by that fleeting expression which came over its face, even though it wads gone seconds later, that it was a fond one.

“Well? Do you mind?”

It made an obvious effort to drag itself back into the present.

“There are two different times when the term is invoked. The first is a simple slaughter, take as much life as possible and revel in the rush of it. A few of the more foolish have killed themselves that way; taken too many lives and lost themselves in it. Not too difficult for the sun to rise, unnoticed, when you’re out of it on the rush of blood and life. And the other is an old ritual. Time-specific, situation-specific, crafted for the more powerful of us to gain strength. Or regain it, as the case may be.”

“Time-specific, you say.”

It tilted its head slightly to one side, “These things always are. And time-specific in both senses of the word, has to start at the right time, and be done before the sun rises.”

“Thanks,” he spoke grudgingly, and its smile widened.

“If yo wanted a hand I could always tap the spell, re-direct the energy. It wouldn’t be too hard, not once it’s started.”

He narrowed his eyes at it; bit back the desire to hit out at it, in much the same way that it would have done so to him, if he’d said something quite that seemingly stupid. That just didn’t work.

“Thanks, but I’m going to be trying to prevent a slaughter, not encourage one.”

Its expression changed, became mocking, a note of which carried through to its words.

“Good luck,” those two words were dripping with a sarcasm which dried as it spoke again, “and you may want to see if you can get a name, too. Might come in handy later on, you know.”