The Blood Is the Life
by Nan Dibble

Chapter 8: Taskin

Peeking out the SUV’s door, Buffy found the air chill and the campsite thickly embedded in fog. The only light was the flames of Spike’s breakfast campfire flicking up like the hands of bright prisoners reaching through a grate. Huddled in a blanket, she shuffled to a log dragged handy to the fire and sat, leaning toward the warmth. His back turned, Spike was doing breakfast preparations next to the van, humming and banging things around. Dawn climbed down past him, also clutching a blanket, and joined Buffy on the log. Blinking into her paper cup of juice, Dawn inquired sourly, “Who wound him up?”

Buffy only smiled. She’d wakened from a pleasant dream to a still more pleasant reality: Spike “starting without her,” as he put it, and happily experimenting to find out which attentions would prompt her to wake and join in. “Nothing like it to work out the kinks,” he’d claimed blithely afterward, and smacked her rear, and bounced out to start breakfast.

Buffy knew better: he still had plenty of kinks left.

She bent her head over a very large yawn she couldn’t cover without losing hold of the blanket. When her jaw unlocked, she asked Dawn, “Where’s Oz?”

“Don’t know. Don’t care. He snores.”

Hearing Spike moving behind her, Buffy entreated plaintively, “Coffee?”

“Right with you, love. Here you go.” Coming and bending, Spike offered a steaming mug until Buffy could figure out the logistics of grasping it without blanket-loss, then was gone again, frighteningly brisk. One of his manic phases. That was OK, Buffy decided. She’d seen all the restrained, solemn depresso-Spike she cared to for awhile.

Venturing to change the mug from hand-warmer to container of heated beverage, Buffy sipped, then reared her head back, demanding, “What’s in this?”

“Little pick-me-up. Medicinal purposes only,” came Spike’s reply.

Buffy chanced another sip of bourbon-flavored café a la Spike, making ook-face. But it was wonderfully hot and it did leave a really pleasant core of warmth in her middle once it was down. She found she could dispense with the blanket after all.

Spike called, “Dogboy’s got oatmeal. If there are any takers, I’ll attempt it.”

“The real kind,” Dawn inquired, “with lumps? Or the add-boiling-water kind with fake fruit?”

“Believe it’s the fake fruit kind. What with the envelope an’ all.”

“Pass,” said Dawn.

“Then pancakes are the thing. An’ I know you like them.”

“You gonna do the death-defying flip thing? ‘Cause if they end up with needles and dirt in ‘em, I’m passing on that, too.”

“Oh, no: I put the needles and dirt in first. Saves time. ‘Tisn’t an automat here, Bit. Finite choices. Eat or starve.” A fresh idea occurred to him: “There’s considerable spoiled blood left, if you’d care to have a go at that.”

“Oh, ick, Spike!” Dawn blurted. “Why’d you have to make me imagine that?”

“Just trying to be obliging here. Uninvited guests have to make do with what they find.”

Buffy held up a tremulous hand. “Eggs?”

“Eggs it is, though that’ll be the last of ‘em. Best wrap this all up today ‘cause tomorrow the larder will be extremely bare.”

“I’m all stiff,” Dawn complained, straightening and then slumping again. “My back hurts. And if you start making time-of-the-month jokes, Spike, you can say goodbye to your dusty remains.”

Looking around, Buffy found Spike momentarily still, looking toward her. They met each other’s eyes for a moment, probably thinking the same thing: the tower; Kim. Then Buffy attended to her coffee-with and Spike went back to cracking a succession of eggs into a saucepan in lieu of a bowl.

“I mean, it’s like trying to sleep on the floor,” Dawn went on, oblivious. “What am I saying: it is trying to sleep on the floor! Aren’t you all lame too?” she asked Buffy.

“No, I think I have all my kinks worked out just fine,” Buffy replied, prompting a loud but indeterminate noise from Spike.

Dawn lifted her chin haughtily. “I really truly don’t want to know.”

Coming to the fire and placing pans and containers in handy positions, Spike sat on his heels, riposting, “Might want to save that for somebody who actually cares.”

“Don’t make them too big,” Dawn instructed, gesturing imperiously. “The little ones taste better.”

“What you need, Bit, is a nice brisk walk. Ten miles or so. Loosen you right up.”

“Fine. I come to console a miserable vamp and I get the scoutmaster from hell.”

“If this whinging is your notion of consolation, I’d hate to find out what actual help would be like.”

“It’s like not playing, Spike: you couldn’t afford it.”

“Yeah, and what’s the going rate on swordfish?”

Their quick-fire, mostly nonsensical bickering was better than anything Buffy had been able to find on the radio, the whole trip. And it didn’t require anything from her at all. They had it down to an art. Like tennis--you didn’t have to understand the insane scoring to watch. Buffy felt amazingly kinkless and content.

About the time Dawn had consumed the first round of pancakes and the single frying pan was being repurposed for scrambled eggs, Oz appeared out of the fog and immediately collected coffee for himself.

“We set?” Spike asked him and Oz nodded, winning by two fewer words.

Pouring frothy eggs into the frying pan, Spike commented, “Then everybody eat up and take care of all necessaries so we can get this show on the road.”

**********

Oz and Spike were someplace up ahead, casting separately across the rocky hillside to locate the Sh’narth trail they’d been backtracking. Buffy was next, frequently visible looking back to check that Dawn, laboring along last, hadn't vanished completely. Although the fog had gone golden with the sunrise, it was still dense and deceiving. Visibility about, like, a foot and a half. Dawn was unhappily aware that she was slowing everybody down.

Her legs hurt. Her back hurt. And hard as she tried to push herself, she couldn’t keep up. Then she walked off the edge of a ravine.

“Everybody else has supers--super speed, super endurance, super-not-tripping-and-skinning-your-knee-and-bleeding-ness--except me. It isn’t fair,” she complained to Spike, crouched before her, starting to wrap a long strip from what had been his T-shirt around the cut.

“Certainly seems like a waste,” he responded. She figured he meant the blood.

“You can taste it if you want,” Dawn offered dispiritedly. “Seal it with spit. Uber-gross, but I don’t care.”

She had blood all down her shin, on her sock, and into her sneaker. She’d never get it out. The sneakers were ruined forever. When Spike didn’t reply, she poked his bare shoulder. “Aren’t you tempted even a little?”

“Oh, something terrible,” he assured her blandly, attending only to the lay of the wrap: smoothing each turn, all of it deft and competent. “Haunt me for years, this will. Feel too tight anyplace? Too tight and it’ll cut off your circulation. Gangrene, amputation, wicked systemic blood poisoning. Render you uneatable for life, that would, and what a terrible disappointment to Michael, poor lad.” He showed her a smirk that combined sardonic, knowing, heartlessly cheerful, and sympathetic all layered together. But although blue, his eyes remained vampire eyes: regarding her as though for this moment, nothing else existed.

Buffy materialized out of the fog on the other edge of the ravine. “Spike?”

“Yes, love.”

“We’re above the tree line, and this fog is gonna burn off.”

“Yeah.”

“There’s no shade. No cover. And we’ve come quite a way from the trees. You have to…. How about if you take Dawn back to camp? Now she’ll never be able to keep up.”

Buffy trying to be tactful: not a pretty picture. She’d managed to annoy them both. Spike bowed his head, tying the last knot, and patted Dawn’s knee gently--at the side, where it wouldn’t hurt. Dawn felt a guilty relief at the prospect of being left behind; Spike was long resigned to the limits, even though he didn’t like them.

Holding out her hand, Dawn murmured, “Spike, meet pretext. Hi! I’m pretext!”

“So you are, pet. And very good at it, too,” Spike murmured back, then stood and turned. “You’re right, Slayer. Just see if you can locate it, then. Don’t you and Oz try to take it on alone. We’ll come back after dark and see to it, once we know where it’s laired.”

Tilting her head, Buffy smiled at him. “Oh, we’ll leave some of the fun for you, never fear.”

Collecting the medium axe--about three feet long, with a double-headed, nearly circular blade--he’d laid aside to take care of Dawn’s knee, Spike flipped to the lip of the ravine. “Hands up, pet,” he directed, and lifted Dawn up beside him. He continued to hold her arm. “Try and see if that knee’s gonna do all right.”

Dawn took an experimental step. “Only a little sore. And klutzy. Maybe that’s my super power: I’m Superklutz! I’ll be fine. Semi-fine, anyway.”

Starting downhill was a little hard: she had to lock the knee at every step. But she tried her best to move normally, to not overstress the other knee and have it lame and hurting too. Spike kept fingers on her elbow, just enough so he could grab if he needed to.

When she was sure she was going to be able to manage, she noticed she could see the ranked trunks of the first trees at the base of the slope, though anything higher was still completely obscured. The fog was lifting. Looking around at Spike, she said, “The fog’s going. I don’t trust it. You go on ahead, and I’ll meet you at the edge of the trees. Really. No need to hobble along with the dorky invalid. If you go all flambé, Buffy’s gonna murder the both of us.”

“Not too far now, Bit.”

“Yeah, too far, if the sun comes out. You wouldn’t make it. Don’t be dumb, get going.” She gave him a shove.

Dawn was surprised when, instead, she found herself lifted off her feet and held in the cradle of his arms. Taking a first long jarring downhill stride, Spike said, “Compromise. See if you can mind the axe.”

Dawn was busy working the haft out from under his arm. So neither of them saw what swooped soundlessly out of the roof of fog and the next instant collided with Spike’s back with the impact of an eighteen-wheeler.

That they were knocked tumbling on a downhill slope was probably the only reason Dawn survived the initial contact. Even still rolling and sliding, she was aware of something big coming down at her like the bucket of a crane and braced both skidding elbows to give her some leverage, some control. Realigning to face the thing, she poked desperately in her overall pocket. Clutching the familiar contour of her taser, she thumbed the safety, jabbed, and fired, holding contact as long as she could, firing button still depressed. BIG breath blowing right in her face, enough to sweep her hair back, and then a recoil: the Taskin’s sportscar-sized head receding to the point Dawn could actually see it whole.

It was beautiful. The head wasn’t reptilian but long and foxlike, with a golden sheen in the early light. Great drooping whiskers or tendrils, saffron shading to vermilion, on either side of the snout, whipped as the Taskin shook its head in reaction to the unpleasant sensation of being tasered. Not hurt at all: only startled and annoyed. Shoving up onto her knees, simultaneously numb and stinging, Dawn knew several things, all together: a taser absolutely wasn’t gonna be enough to drive the Taskin off, much less disable it; the Taskin had been drawn by the scent of her freaking blood--again! again!--and had locked onto her as prey; ergo, she wasn’t gonna be able to handle this on her own. She was toast. And where was Spike?

Looking wildly uphill, past the barrel chest and strongly muscled forelimbs that were all she could see of the Taskin’s body, she located Spike: the Taskin was standing on his back, huge talons gripping and releasing reflexively. What interest did a Taskin have in a cool, nearly scentless vampire when a tasty-looking/smelling human was leaking blood from a dozen cuts and scrapes?

Because Spike didn’t move, Dawn knew he couldn’t. So Dawn’s first priority had to be getting the Taskin off him. As the Taskin’s head dipped, jaws agape, Dawn tasered it in the chin the instant it was in reach. As the Taskin again recoiled, Dawn clambered to her feet and started running along the slant of the hill rather than down it. Certain that any second that long neck would stretch out and the jaws chomp down on her like a Popsicle, she concentrated completely on the obstructions, her balance, and making her running, jumping feet go where they had to be and pushing off again the second they hit.

The Taskin made a noise like Errrrrrghhh! almost in Dawn’s ear, scaring her half to death. Then she caught the crunch of its huge feet shifting on the loose gravel. It had moved, and not to come after her: it didn’t need to. After the next arms-lifted bound, Dawn landed solidly and dared to stop, turn, and look.

Spike was up on his knees. He’d recovered the axe and was whacking away at the Taskin’s nearest leg: so close that he’d had to choke way up on the axe haft and lean back to cut at it at all. So he wasn’t doing much damage, although the gashes were running with a milky-white fluid. The Taskin’s head was twisting around on the long sinuous neck topped with streamers and banners of umber-gold and cinnamon. Surprisingly agile for such a large creature, it danced its rear quarters away on the pivot of its forelegs, two sets of rigid wings the size of city blocks, tip to tip, working in a butterfly-like flap to assist the hop-and-turn. Dawn ducked fast as the tail whipped right over her. Then she dove onto the tail about halfway down, hung on with legs and arms, and tasered it with a continuous charge, cheek pressed tight against the warm, dusty-feeling hide. The tail twitched, trying to shake her loose, but she hung on fiercely and wasn’t dislodged.

It seemed forever before the tail stilled and the huge body heeled over. Dawn’s mouth was full of blood: she’d bitten her tongue. Really disgusting no matter what vamps said.

Spike, she thought then, and moved away from the tail, back uphill, scuttling like a beetle.

He was sprawled partly in and partly out of a shallow runoff gully that maybe had protected him from some of the weight. But it hadn’t protected him from the talons. Two deep gouges the diameter of baseball bats were punched in high on his back, welling blood in the slow, grudging way that vamps bled. Something wrong with the angle at which his torso met his hips. Almost certainly internal injuries she couldn’t even guess at. But he hadn’t dusted. Hadn’t dusted. Hadn’t dusted. Dawn muttered that like a mantra, patting hesitantly at his face, willing his eyes to focus on her: acknowledge and reassure her. They were half-open, dull, unmoving. But he hadn’t dusted, so it would be all right, had to be.

Then the sun came out.

************

Naturally it was Oz who located the lair. Buffy was good in a fight but had never claimed to be any kind of scout. Given that it would be more than an hour’s walk back to camp, Buffy decided to stick around and see if the Taskin came back rather than walk the whole distance between this cave and camp four times in a day. But by 10:00 there’d been no sign of it, and with all the fog burned off, their chances of surprising it at close range were pretty much shot. So Buffy slung the broadsword, in its sheath, over her shoulder and began the long downhill trudge.

She was trying to talk Oz into staying in Sunnydale another couple of weeks. She thought it would cheer Willow up considerably and maybe provide a buffer in the Kennedy situation. And as for rekindling romance…well, one never knew, did one? But of course she couldn’t say any of this to Oz, so her persuasions, logic, and reasons became increasingly fanciful, ornate, and preposterous. She even found herself arguing that it would be such a help to Spike to have a guy around he could really rely on. She imagined Spike snickering at the idea but nevertheless plowed on gamely.

By that point Oz was looking at her as though he suspected her of having some contagious insanity and the intention of biting him. Being Oz, though, he didn’t actually express his alarmed skepticism in actual words.

In the middle of Buffy’s rambling reminiscence of happy High School events the six (counting Cordelia) of them had shared, like the eruption of Hellhounds at the prom, Oz went into intent hunting mode as suddenly as though a switch had been flipped. He changed course and lengthened stride, leaving Buffy with her mouth open, surprised and belatedly charging after him.

The dragon, the Taskin, was dead. Its ungainly sprawled carcass took up a good third of a long scree-covered slope--as though a holiday parade balloon had broken loose and drifted to this landing place, partially deflated, dwarfing everything around it like a new feature of the landscape. Buffy could see it was like a Sh’narth and yet not--as colorful but more sleek and slender, more like a quick, jewel-bright lizard than a rampant crocodile, not that it was in the least reptilian. It was hard to come up with apt comparisons for something that weighed as much as a whole herd of cattle and yet conveyed an impression of delicacy and quickness. Even if it hadn’t, improbably, been equipped with two banks of wings like those of an enormous dragonfly.

Buffy approached the head cautiously. Its jaw had been hacked at, as had its neck. But the throat wound was probably what had killed it. In the beast’s death throes, the head had been thrown back into an S-curve against the spine; Buffy’s whole body would have fit into the exposed gash.

Walking further around the downhill side, Buffy noticed that one of the wings had been chopped off and had been propped diagonally between the ground and a portion of the tail, forming a kind of awning. Then she saw that it was Spike’s axe embedded in the wing stump and immediately began struggling uphill toward the awning where Oz was already crouched. She assumed it was Dawn hurt, and her first sight of her sister did nothing to change that assumption: both Dawn’s arms were scraped and gashed, her overalls were torn out at both knees, and she was sitting forlornly on the ground.

“Dawnie! How bad are you hurt?” Buffy demanded, hands hovering to grab but not yet sure what would be a safe, uninjured place.

Instead of answering, Dawn twisted and pointed a shaking hand at the improvised awning. “It was all I could think to do. But it took too long. I tried, but the bone just wouldn’t come loose. But it’ll be OK, he hasn’t dusted so it’ll be OK…”

Buffy thumped down on her knees as the actual situation penetrated. “Oz. Go bring the SUV as close as you can, as fast as you can. It’s got four-wheel drive. Wait! Here’s the keys.” As Oz took off, Buffy inched closer to the shade cast by the propped wing.

Dawn was saying, “I couldn’t leave because I had to move the wing. Keep the sun off.”

“You did fine, Dawn. I wouldn’t have thought the two of you could take a thing like this down.”

“It came up from behind, from the fog. Spike was already hurt before it stepped on him. I tried to draw it away, to let him up--”

“You did fine. I’m very proud of you.” Unbuttoning her blouse, Buffy was calm--even happy. She knew exactly what was to be done, and that it would be enough. Not having a knife handy, she scratched hard at the mark until it bled. “Now, this is important, Dawn: if I pass out, you have to make him stop. Any way you have to.”

“Yeah. I understand. I thought, but he wouldn’t, he wasn’t--”

Buffy had stopped listening. The space of shade under the wing didn’t have room for two, so she hiked herself up until at least her head and shoulders were in the dark. Her sun-dazzled eyes couldn’t make out much detail. But there was a strong smell of burning. Didn’t matter: no matter how bad he was, she’d seen worse. And for any vampire, healing was in the blood; and her blood best of all.

Because Spike hadn’t yet moved or reacted, she rubbed fingers against the bleeding mark and touched the wet to his lips. No reaction, so again. A seismic twitch through the whole of his body. Buffy bent to him, over him, comfortably and calmly, and felt the familiar tingle-and-draw when his mouth latched on and he began to feed. Nothing so bad that her blood couldn’t heal it. And no least discomfort anymore at offering. This was what they were and what they did. Sufficient to one another.

So Dawn could monitor, Buffy hummed a tune, a lullaby.

**********

It was like the mother and father of all hangovers plus the aftereffects of a bar fight in which he’d taken on all comers. But dark, quiet, all around: he was someplace safe. No need to move, which was lucky--he didn’t much feel like moving.

Buffy’s voice said, “Willow’s bringing more blood. The tribute blood. Oz has gone to meet her halfway. In the meantime, there’s this.”

The curved rim of a cup was held against his mouth and an arm started to lift him. He lost the moment in a flare of pain.

The next time he became aware, there was a strong, good taste in his mouth. Yet need, hunger, was a quivering ache all through him. His head turned toward the nearest source of warmth.

The warmth was Buffy: he could smell and feel her close. Her voice said, “Good. Time for round seven. Here it comes.”

His mouth was full of blood. Lukewarm, not hot from the source. He swallowed convulsively. More was supplied until he was sated. Whatever he’d gotten himself into, he’d taken serious damage. He lay thinking, feeling the blood working in him like the throbbing of an engine. A sense memory popped up: the scent of marigolds. He remembered the Taskin.

“Bit--!”

“Fine,” Buffy’s voice reassured. “Scraped up, but fine.”

He couldn’t move, wasn’t quick enough, was gonna lose her--

It seemed to him he was talking to Buffy about the soul. Complaining of it: how it ruined feeding, fighting. No joy in them anymore. The things that were rightfully his. Buffy was responding that since he’d paid for it and that store had a no returns policy, he was stuck with it. When he started to argue, Buffy turned into Dawn, sitting high above him on top of a pillar, all dressed in white.

Dawn said, “You have your wings back. But it’s only temporary.” She began to bleed. Streaks of bright crimson down the chalk white pillar. She added, “Nothing to do with us at all.”

His shoulders ached. Missing the weight of his wings, where they’d been torn off. He couldn’t lift and reach her, where she was. Couldn’t stop her being hurt. Couldn’t move--

“It’s me,” said Dawn’s voice, confusingly right beside him, all warm and smelling like herself so he couldn’t doubt it. “The walking Band-Aid. It’s OK. You don’t have to worry. We killed it.” (Remembered smell of marigold: the Taskin’s creamy blood, heavy and sticky.) “Now, don’t be all tiresome about this, all right?”

He was presented with a mark that wasn’t his own. Flesh that smelled nearly the same but not. Didn’t mistake one for the other--too confusing. His demon didn’t care, wanted her anyway, but he didn’t allow that. He made the demon subside, retreat.

“Buffy,” Dawn’s voice complained, “I told you: he just won’t.”

“No problemo. I’m all set for another go. You be minder, OK?”

Then she came to him, his love, all warm with his mark upon her--healed but fresh-bitten, so that he hesitated. Perhaps it was that other that she wanted. But he was empty, and hurt. Another way, then.

She breathed a giggle in his ear, then whispered, “Mustn’t scandalize the children. C’mon: bite the nice lady. Burns are almost all gone. This is for the deep stuff. Spike?”

“Demon,” he explained, troubled. “Wants too much.”

“Demon is right,” she said. “You need this. It’s OK. You’ll know when to stop.”

While he puzzled over Buffy and the demon agreeing about anything, she laced her fingers through his, laid her cheek against his. Where she touched, no pain was. She began humming, and it seemed to him he remembered that, and feeding, all serene. The good heat in his mouth, moving to his core. Since that seemed to be what she wanted, and the demon wanted too, he released himself to it, and all the while she hummed, all good and peaceful.

It seemed Dawn was seated on a tall pillar, looking very stern and put out. Her hair was a bronze helmet--plain, with a nosepiece that reached the chin. The fingers of her right hand were curved around a well made, long-bladed spear upright beside her; on her left shoulder an owl perched. She demanded, “Why are you being so stubborn?”

For a moment it was as though the conversation were a scene in a play and he’d forgotten what his response should be. Then he remembered: Non serviam: I will not serve.

She said, “All creatures serve us, willing or unwilling. Willing is merely more efficient. Why do you persist in resisting?”

“Because I can. Your purposes are not mine. You have no authority I recognize. I’m not your property. I don’t consent.”

The pillar was descending. When the top stood level, he saw that her eyes were blank and white as marble. “You believe yourself a citadel in a high place, with strong towers. You believe you can defy us with impunity. What if we take the towers, one by one, and hold as hostage all within? What if we visit suffering upon all you hold in allegiance, on that account alone? Will you not take pity on them and be weakened thereby? We will not be defied, creature. If you will not serve our purposes willingly, we will break you to them, to your loss and ours, for you will then be a poor tool, marred and of little use. Quickly discarded.”

“Fuck yourselves,” Spike responded flatly, and woke into the scent of pine with a map in his mind.

**********

On Monday, when Willow had only early classes, she came both in her capacity as healer and to get away from Kennedy, though she of course didn’t admit to the latter purpose. Dawn figured everybody knew anyway.

She pronounced on Dawn to the tune of abrasions and contusions and a sprained wrist, which she insisted on wrapping, although most of the swelling was already gone. Dawn made a fuss because she felt it was expected of her; and so the proprieties were observed. As far as Spike went, there wasn’t much that could be done--vamps healed in their own way, at their own pace--but Willow prescribed an herbal tea that Spike spat out after the first taste, and instructed Buffy in deep muscle massage, which he seemed prepared to resign himself to, which Dawn interpreted as his liking it very much.

The burned skin had all sloughed by yesterday evening and he was often awake now. And often his eyes turned to her, or he called her from wherever she was in the new campsite among the trees where sun came only at noon and not much then. And he wanted to see how the scabs were, on her knees and elbows, and wanted her to rub lotion into them while he watched, so he could be sure she was doing it. Anxious about her, that her healing went so slowly: nearly three whole days, after all. He didn’t seem able to keep straight that she wasn’t super anything, just herself, no matter how often she reminded him with increasing vexation.

His being such a fussbudget over a few ridiculous scrapes, when he’d broken nearly every major bone in his body, struck Dawn as embarrassing and disproportionate. When Oz presented her with a trophy necklace--one of the Taskin’s medium fangs (the big ones were banana-sized) bored through the top and hung on a cord--she had a screaming fit about it, first at Oz and then at Spike, when she found out he’d asked Oz to make it. Then she flung off among the trees, sat on a stump, and cried herself dry for about the twentieth time because Spike certainly should know, even if the others didn’t: it was all her fault.

Buffy, who generally could be stopped dead by a sufficient tantrum, came to check on her and didn’t leave when yelled at. Likely Spike would yell at her if she retuned to the SUV without an adequate report. Being Buffy right now probably sucked: stuck between an ill-tempered invalid vampire and her insane-o sister. She looked quite pale and tired, Dawn noted guiltily.

Dawn burst out, “Go have a nap. Take a walk. Something. It’s my snit, and I’d rather have it in peace.”

“Just explain what you’re snitting about. Because your bedside manner leaves something to be desired. Spike tried to come after you and that was not a really great idea.”

“I never asked him to!”

“Didn’t say you did. But if you were aiming for post trauma reaction hysterics, it’s a little late. You should have tried that on yesterday. It would have been more convincing then.”

“It’s all my fault,” Dawn confessed, throwing her arms in the air. She could feel her whole face twisting up again, dumb and ugly. “If I hadn’t tripped like a dork and then trotted around bleeding, practically begging to be bait, the Taskin wouldn’t have surprised us and Spike wouldn’t have been hurt. And then I couldn’t cut the wing fast enough. Can’t do anything right!”

It was perfectly wretched of Buffy to tap her cheek and look amused. “Now, where have I heard that before?” she asked herself. “Let’s run down the checklist here so I can get this straight. On a very steep slope, full of unstable footing, you tripped and fell into a ditch on purpose as an excuse to get out of the hunt. Right?”

“Of course not!”

“Thus providing me with an excellent excuse to send Spike back with you, when he had no business coming in the first place, but he wouldn’t listen, he hardly ever does. So when the beastie stooped on you out of nowhere, pretty much immobilizing Spike, you panicked and ran. Right?”

“Well, no. I tried the taser. But that was no good--only made it mad. So I made it as mad as I could. So it would get off Spike.”

“Which it did. And Spike, who doesn’t care about you the least little bit, was so disgusted with your uselessness, he let the Taskin eat you and end of story. Right?”

Dawn hung her head. “No,” she admitted softly, caught between wretchedness and awe at what she’d been too busy to see or take in at the time and only understood later: in the awful time of hurting, waiting, and fighting the sun. “He made it come back at him. So he could reach it. I was so scared. He cut it everywhere he could. And when it tried to bite him, it was in reach, and he cut its fucking head off!”

“Sounds like pretty good tag-team fighting to me. But then again, what would I know about that?”

“But…I didn’t think of the wing fast enough. And then I took forever to climb up and cut it loose, and the axe was all heavy and slippery, and he actually caught fire--!”

Dawn was furious at herself that her breath was hitching again, stupid and weepy. Buffy wrapped arms around her from behind, her chin on Dawn’s shoulder. “I think I’ll grant you an extension on the reaction hysterics. Provided you wear the tooth.” Buffy dangled it in front of Dawn’s face. “Because Spike’s all proud of how brave you were and he’s not bright enough to realize it’s all a mistake. So let’s not confuse him. Dawn Dragonkiller.”

“That’s really dumb.” Dawn dragged the wrist wrap under her nose. At least it was good for something.

“Let’s not tell him that either. Wait till he’s on his feet. Then you can snark at each other as much as you please over who’s more to blame for this terrible fiasco, that accomplished exactly what we set out to do with none dead, two hurt, and none who won’t recover.”

Lest Buffy think she’d given in, Dawn warned, “If I miss school tomorrow too, you have to write me a note!”

“I’m thinking Wednesday. So one big note, covering all current sins of omission. Wish granted.” Buffy again danced the tooth on its cord.

Dawn snatched it ungraciously and looped the cord over her head. The way Spike was weighing her down with junk was getting ridiculous. First the locket and now this. She dashed back toward the SUV to find a mirror to see how it looked. Certainly nobody else at school had a tooth like this, and double-certain not from a beautiful deadly creature they’d helped kill.

She had to admit, Dawn Dragonkiller was kind of cool, actually.

**********

Spike thought he’d made good progress, considering. When Oz wasn’t around, he’d got from Buffy the scrap she’d written the phone number of Dogboy’s contact on. Tucked it safe in the only pocket he had, that of the one red button-up shirt he’d brought, but it should be good enough there. And in odd moments he tried to memorize it, which wasn’t going so well, but numbers had never been his best thing anyway and there were distractions. Like Buffy hanging about so near, every moment he was awake, which was naturally all he knew about. Wasn’t the best circumstances overall since most of him wasn’t working anything like right yet, but still. She was close, wasn’t leaving or likely to, so that was all right. Fine, even.

He knew he’d had quite a lot of her blood, over however many days it was since Dawn had been so marvelously brave, helping take that beastie down. Should cut way back on that, he knew. But it just wasn’t in him to refuse when she laid down with him and offered. Pestered, even, the way she did. So instead of the months it’d taken for his back to heal that other time, when she’d dropped a pipe-organ on him, he thought a week or so should do. What with the tribute blood, that Red had brought twice now if his count was right, and the little Buffy allowed Dawn to contribute when it was brought to him in a mug, which was only right since Bit lacked the Slayer healing to make up the deficit within hours, he couldn’t remember a time when he’d ever been fed up so fine. Pity they hadn’t been friends that other time, he and Buffy. Bit of Slayer blood, once or twice a day, would have done excellently and no need of the fucking damn wheelchair. Always foolish to wish the past different, but there you were.

And he’d picked up on her cue, about keeping Dogboy around, and dropped some little hint himself every chance he got. Nothing obvious. Thing to do was help Oz talk himself into it, which Spike didn’t figure should be all that difficult, considering the inducements. To look at them, you’d hardly think Red and Dogboy were acquainted, much less had any inclination toward one another. All sad-faced (in Willow’s case) or poker-faced (that was Oz), mostly not exchanging a direct word or a straight look, glum and avoiding anything resembling contact. But though more spacious than the van, the SUV wasn’t exactly Madison Square Garden. Both of them there sometimes, helping out with things, they’d bump or brush by one another and then act as though they’d been scuffing rugs and sparked each other: heart rates would fly into the stratosphere, breath changing, scent changing, near panic reaction. And definitely not revulsion, on Red’s side.

And Spike knew perfectly well that if he knew it, Oz knew it. Nose that could track Sh’narth across bare rock couldn’t miss such a thing. Not doing much of anything about it yet, too petrified and discouraged for that. But had to know it, all the same. So it shouldn’t be all that hard to make him hang about somewhat longer than he’d planned.

Spike didn’t trouble himself conjecturing what the witch noticed or knew. Likely a lot. But she was as apt as anybody to be monumentally stupid, skittish, and wrong-headed about anything that touched her deeply. Take the Slayer, for instance. Take himself, even.

So Spike and Buffy agreed that whatever Spike needed done, by way of getting things or moving around much, they’d have Oz do. Could have managed without, certainly. But it suited them both to have Dogboy doing it instead. For a tether. Nothing said about it, of course: no need. As in most things, Spike caught her lead and followed it. It might be handy to have Oz about for awhile, Spike thought. And not only for Red. He didn’t think that Harris would be much use, and there’d have to be somebody to look after Dawn. And Red, of course. If he was to be a Watcher, with all that entailed, at least for a while--until he could get the rest set up.

To pass the time, they were playing draw poker, deuces wild, with pebbles as stakes. Four-handed, since Buffy had gone to have a quiet lie-down someplace. Dawn had taken three. Requesting two, Spike frowned and held his cards a little farther off than he would in a real game. A bit hard to tell a six from an eight. It wasn't a proper Bicycle deck but an off-brand Red had picked up at a convenience store along the way, stopping for gas and emergency groceries at twice the price.

Oz stood pat, which meant he’d probably fold next time around. He seemed to do that. Lack of confidence, maybe.

“Dealer takes three.” Setting down her discard and then arranging her hand, Willow lifted a flick of a glance and said to Spike, “Remind me to show you something when we get back.”

“What?”

She shook her head. “Easier to show you. Just remind me.”

The bet was to Dawn, She bet two and put in the pebbles. Returning, her fingers went back to the Taskin tooth: touching it. Adjusting it. So she’d reconciled herself to it, whatever had been upsetting her so, Spike thought.

Dawn inquired solicitously, “You want to sleep some more?”

“Oh. Call. Good thing we’re not playing for real. Not paying proper attention here.”

Oz laid his hand neatly face-down on the tray table, folding.

Willow raised two, Dawn called her, and Spike dropped out on a feeble pair of sixes. Willow took the pot with two pair, sevens and fives. She took the next hand, too, bluffing out Dawn with a bid of ten, which was pretty foolish considering they were playing for dirt.

The deal came to Spike, and his hands worked well enough to shuffle and then pitch the cards in good order, and palm an ace in setting the deck down.

“Oh, by the way, Spike,” said Willow, “thought you’d like to know: you’ve got your wings back.”

Spike stilled and looked at her, deeply startled.

Willow continued obliviously, “Pretty much at full stretch again, ‘cause it goes right through the roof.” Then she glanced up and startled a bit in turn. Then her whole face warmed, and she grinned. “Your aura, you idiot. It’s back to normal. New normal, anyway. For you.” Her grin broadened and she even twinkled a little.

“Oh, I’m all relieved to hear it. Worried me quite a bit, that did.” The palmed ace gave him a pair, which was promising. “Oz, you still with us?”

“Yeah.” Oz considered his hand very carefully. Then folded.

*********

The sun was gone. With the rear seat pushed all the way back to make space, Buffy found sitting on the floor in the open doorway of the SUV, feet on the ground, was almost like sitting on the porch at Casa Summers. Except much more pine smell.

Leaning on a backrest of blankets and assorted gear, Spike lit his second cigarette and breathed smoke. “Could flat one of the tires. That would hold him up awhile.”

“Still doesn’t get Willow in, though.”

“Send her off on some errand,” he suggested. “Then take off. Make some excuse.”

Buffy shook her head. “She’d never buy that.”

“Don’t have to sell it, pet--only do it. What’s her alternative here: walk?”

That Willow’s rental car, parked way back by the highway, had to be disabled first was a given.

Buffy frowned, considering. “She could teleport. Well, she did it once.”

“Didn’t know that. Thought that was just Anya’s bag of tricks…. She enough of a fool to pass up the chance?”

“If she was mad enough, being played like that. Maybe.”

“Nobody likes being played,” Spike admitted. He shrugged and then went very still, plainly wishing he hadn’t. After a minute or two, he relaxed, resting more of his weight against her. “Come right out and tell her, then.”

“Are you crazy?”

“You don’t think?”

“Never. She’d have to admit to it. To herself. And she’d probably feel honor bound to tell Oz. Then he’d go all strange too. Big mess. She won’t make the choice. So we have to make it for her.” Buffy was silent awhile, thinking. “Put that way, it sounds terrible, doesn’t it.”

“No problem with it here, love. Turn about’s fair play. She owes you a few of those. Doesn’t begin to compare to hauling you out of heaven, stealing your memory, or half the other trash she’s pulled, all in your very best interests, of course.”

“Still…. Are you sure Oz has a spare?”

“Think Oz has a spare everything. Got that van tricked out so it’s ready for fire, flood, or apocalypse. Regular boy scout.”

Buffy said, “No: I knew Kirk, and he’s no James Tiberius Kirk.”

“Having a geek moment?” Willow asked brightly, coming around the front of the SUV.

Buffy jerked, but Spike, the more experienced conspirator, didn’t even twitch, drawling calmly, “Something like. Red, meant to ask you: could you check that my locket’s in working order? Expect it took a bit of a beating.”

Buffy asked, “Locket?”

“Just a trinket Red ran up for me.”

Stooping, Willow muttered, “’Scuse me getting personal here. Seems intact, except…except the whole back’s gone. So everything inside’s gone, too.” She straightened and stood away, wrinkle-brow concerned. Then she reached to her own neck, saying, “I can lend you mine--”

“No. When we get back is soon enough. You keep yours. Any damage there was to do, have to figure it’s been done. No, you keep it, Red.”

Buffy persisted, “What’s the deal with the locket?”

Willow said, “I’m sorry-- I never even thought. No, wait, wait: I know!” Frowning, Willow shut her eyes a moment in obvious concentration, and then cautiously inserted a hand in a pocket and produced a small clay wafer. “Ta Da!” she exclaimed, grinning proudly, and handed it to Spike.

“Love, I believe there’s some tape in the First Aid box. Maybe a knife, or scissors. Get ‘em for me, would you?” As Buffy slid down in order to step up, Spike asked Willow, “What was the trick of that, then?”

“Just a little playing with probabilities. I might have stuck one in my pocket, just on the off chance. And it might not have broken. So I just made might into is. Don’t run the risk of paradox that way. Oh, here, I’ll do it, let me.”

Confronted with Willow’s reaching hands, Buffy surrendered the tape and scissors and watched dubiously as Spike extended his left arm, his better one, and Willow gently but firmly brushed it away to undo two more buttons of his shirt, push it aside, and tape the wafer high on his chest, just below the shoulder, explaining, “Not much motion there. Should be good enough.” Setting aside tape and scissors, Willow re-did the buttons, then patted the shirt flat. “There. All set.”

Buffy remarked, “Didn’t know you two were on shirt-patting terms.”

“We get on,” commented Spike comfortably. “Most times.”

And Willow said, “I already told him: he’s not my type.”

Then they both looked at her like two amiable tigers, to see if she was gonna try to make a thing about it. Dawn interrupted, running up to report Oz said supper was ready.

Stepping down, Buffy asked Spike, “Some blood?” Realizing her hand had gone automatically to the mark, rubbing the itchy, tingling sensation set off by even the thought of contact, she hastily snatched it down. Deduct points for unsubtle.

Spike looked up from lighting a fresh cigarette, smiling, mostly with his eyes: he knew. “Later. The bagged, that Red brought, it’s still good. That will do.”

“OK,” Buffy responded, disappointed and relieved, all at once. She wasn’t exactly shy about feeding him, but prudence required a minder, and it was uncomfortable to have something so personal watched, even by her sister.

She’d thought, now that he was aware and alert, to do without the minder. But he’d said no, on the grounds that it wasn’t just a nip and a taste but a full feeding and he wouldn’t trust her, or himself, to know the difference between enough and too much, and Buffy knew better than to argue with him about a thing like that.

She, Dawn, and Willow started toward the campfire. They’d gone only a few yards when Spike called her name in an odd, flat voice.

She wheeled. “What?”

He said, “Might want to collect it, then come inside to eat. Might want to leave tonight instead of tomorrow.” He still had that odd note in his voice.

“Why?”

“Joker with the pop-gun is back.”

It took Buffy a few seconds longer than Willow, whirling to glare at the dark forest, to take his meaning: he’d been shot again.