banner by kazzy_cee

Savannah, Part One, The Grass

"Give her what she deserves..." Spike mumbled as he moved another rock. A whip cracked against his back and he bit his lips, trying to go back to the smell of her. The feel of her hair under his hands. That little gasp and the way her eyes widened and didn't avoid his when he pressed up inside her.

When he fucked her, she didn't lie.

When he fucked her, he saw the truth of how she saw him in her eyes.

He didn't manage to avoid the kick this time from the demon slaver. "Listen up, disgusting soul-beast, do your work or--" He kicked Spike's sore ribs. "Maybe I'll ask for you again tonight, hmmmm, pretty?"

......

Buffy leaned against the stone wall of the cave, wiping her mouth.

Morning sickness. How come they called it that when she had it all the time?

"Buff?" Xan was there, as he always was. He pulled her into his arms, his front to her back and rubbed a cool hand over her forehead. "Come on back to the fire. I got crackers!"

She gave a soggy laugh, feeling fragile, no matter that she was The Slayer. She let her beloved friend lead her from the dark. "Also," he said, his one good eye fixed on her with Xander devotion. "I'm not cleaning that up tomorrow!"

She smiled. "I guess you've done your fair share of slayer puke lately." He handled her as gently as a blown glass ornament, sitting her down by the fire and cupping her face. She leaned her forehead against him and gave a ragged sigh.

"Hey, just what a guy does for his hero, right?"

Buffy looked at their pathetic little fire. Xander had had to go further afield into the grass to find enough wood to keep her warm through the night, but as usual, he hadn't complained. She held his hand as he rubbed her sore back. She swallowed, hoping she could keep from a bout of the dry heaves. "Being pregnant really sucks!" she told him.

"I know," he comforted, but said nothing else. He hadn't asked her about the father... with all the talk of what a slut she was, she was grateful. She hadn't had the courage to tell him the truth.

"I'm not much of a hero anymore. I can't even manage to patrol!" She moved restlessly because the truth was she was terrified for Xander. He went out onto the Grass now and took her patrol, looking out for poachers and protecting this last pocket of humanity. He'd already lost an eye for her cause, and she was terrified one of the roving gangs would find him and kill him, as much because of his secret then because he alone stood by her.

"I'm not doing so badly." He picked up the walkie-talkie radio he'd scavenged from the waste lands and carefully repaired. "Look at this! Working! Now you can talk to me when I'm out on the Grass."

Buffy shook her head and put a hand over his cheek. "You take so many risks!"

"Naw." His face was creased with shadow. Too little sleep. She looked at his hands and saw scabs and scratches. He couldn't heal like she could.

"Promise me you won't go too far tomorrow?"

He saw the tears she was suppressing. "I promise. So you going to go to the church social with Riley?"

Buffy bit her lip. "No, when the rumors started about... you know, he didn't want to be seen with the town slut."

"Don't! Don't call yourself that!" Xander looked furious and Buffy looked away.

"It's probably true, not that I can remember..."

"Things will be okay. You're a good person, and a hero, so things have got to be okay again." He pulled her close and she closed her eyes, so tired she even forgot to ask him for some crackers.

"I don't think things are ever okay for people like me," she whispered, then felt ashamed of herself for her self-pity. But the truth was, she had been a hero all her life and now when she was terrified and alone except for this boy who was as much an outcast as herself, she really needed a hero of her own.

........

I love you without knowing how, or when or from where.
I love you straightforwardly, without complexities or pride;
so I love you because I know no other way--Sonnet XVII, Pablo Neruda

Xander closed his eye and walked through the grass, letting the feather tips brush against his fingers. The ground was silken mud beneath his hardened bare feet. He could feel cracks in it, sealed up tight since it had been a week or more since the last rain.

The air smelled like spices from far away. Places he'd never see. The ruins of fine cities. The types of entertainment a simple man couldn't even imagine.

He squatted down and found a piece of silvered wood for their fire. It looked as old as the bones of a dinosaur. Once, trees had grown here. There had been more water.

Xander couldn't imagine it. It seemed like this place had always been the Savannah. Home to weeds and grazing animals and the herds run by a handful of ranchers.

All of them, and the tiny town snug in the middle, protected from roaming gangs of humans and demons by the hands and will of one girl.

........

"You aren't welcome here, fag!" Forrest growled.

Buffy slapped his hand away from Xander, who had swallowed and backed off from Riley's gang. "How dare you!" Buffy spat. "He's not... not one of them," she finished, not looking back at her friend, who was holding his hat and staring at his bare feet.

"He keeps you busy, does he?" Forrest asked, cocking one brow.

Buffy flushed, looking around at the towns people shuffling past on their way to church. She felt like Hester Prynne. "Yes," she whispered, reaching back to give Xander's hand a reassuring squeeze.

"Whore!" Forrest spat and headed into the church.

Buffy's eyes filled, but she swallowed and took a deep breath. Don't give them the satisfaction.

"I'll wait for you here, Buff," Xander said, his brown eye on his bare feet. He'd dressed up specially to escort her into town, as he did every Sunday, but his pants were patched and the brown color worn to a thin grey in places. His messy brown hair looked like it had been chopped in ragged tufts, which is what he did for himself when he thought of it. He wasn't welcome in the town barbers.

"No! You can't just let them..."

"Not worth fighting about. I don't care about what they think of me."

She bent her head, not wanting to see that deadness in his one eye. Jesse. She hadn't been able to save Jesse.

"Maybe... stay out of sight until I get back?" She hated to ask him to do that. Hated to trample the shreds of his pride, but she didn't want to find him with his pants around his ankles and tar all over his bare ass, like she had a month ago.

"I'll be here." He smiled because he could see how upset she was. "Don't let them see you're hurting."

She shook her head, taking the old-fashioned handkerchief he carried and wiping her eyes. "I hate that I do that now," she said.

"It's natural, so don't you fret." One gentle hand cupped her cheek and combed her hair, then it was gone and her bashful friend disappeared around the corner of a white shingled house. She knew when church was done he'd be there to walk her back to their rustic home.

When Buffy went to the church door, people pulled away from her, glaring and whispering. She kept her eyes forward and her chin up. Don't let them see you hurt.

Preacher Wilkins smiled at her. "I'm glad you're here, young lady. I wrote about fallen women today in hopes it might be helpful to you."

Buffy made it to her pew at the back. No one else sat with her. She closed her eyes and put a hand on her lower tummy, hoping she wouldn't be sick.

"You okay?" a gentle voice asked.

She looked up, knowing that voice from her dreams. "Angel..." she couldn't help but smile at him shyly.

"You look... tired," he said, his dark eyes full of worry as he studied her. "Buffy, is it true what I heard about you? That you're--"

"I'm fine." She wanted to say more, desperately, but his wife, Willow, her former friend, came over to collect him.

Preacher Wilkins addressed the congregation then, and Buffy reached for her bible, hoping she could find some comfort there.

.......

"You were a good fighter once, soul-beast," the demon, Slonge, told Spike.

Spike had his face pressed against the smooth rock of the cave where he was a slave. The stone was damp from the earth and felt good against the burning bruise on his cheek. When he ran his hands over it, sometimes he thought it was her dress, and he was on his knees, begging her to forgive him... and sometimes he knew it was only stone and it felt good because he hurt.

"I might have fought once," he whispered. "Fought for her once. Tried to be her hero."

"Crazy! Can you fight with a sword?"

Spike nodded, knowing better than to offer any defiance.

A claw moved over him, where his shirt stuck to the bright stripes of red on his back before trailing down and cupping his ass. He closed his eyes. Nono. "Don't speak and he won't see you. Won't find you," he whispered comfort to himself, then giggled, only to break into a ragged sob. He buried his face against the wall, wishing he could disappear into it.

"See what gettin' a soul did for you?" He was shoved into position, and he heard a sound of despair. Did he make that sound? Or was it her? He kept his face turned away. If he didn't look, it wasn't happening.

........

Buffy woke up half way through the night, sweating. She felt what little dinner she'd managed moving up against the back of her throat. She covered her mouth, tossed away her blanket and ran for the cave entrance. This time she made it outside onto the Grass before she vomited.

After, like many nights, she leaned against the rock wall and held herself. Her thin white nightie wasn't much protection against the cool night and the restless wind that moved endlessly across the Savannah, but the cool air helped her with the sickness and the sweat of her illness dried on her forehead.

This time Xander didn't wake, so she was alone under the great moon, which looked a bit like a giant alien star ship, it loomed so close. She smiled, remembering Xander's comic books which she read sometimes when she had to camp out on the grass.

She frowned when she saw what looked like a plume of smoke off on the horizon. Campfire. Xander would have to go investigate in the morning since Buffy wasn't sure whether she would be up to it. The pregnancy and her weakness had zapped all her energy and put it into her child.

She rubbed her forehead, remembering her dream. That night. Invited to the fancy party. Thinking she was welcome, at last.

She didn't know she was crying until a tear spilled over the hand cupped over her jaw.

........

Spike sat with his katana, wiping the blade clean from the blood that had flowed over it during tonight's duel. Fighting wasn't as bad as the mines, but it made his soul scream every time his katana flashed a feint and then his wakizashi waited in his hand, taking the upper slice through flesh as if it isn’t a part of him.

He got up, and made his way to the familiar cave wall that calmed him.

He'd discovered her image on it a long time ago. He knew the others thought he was mad the way he talked to her. He traced it now, knowing anyone else just saw bumps and rises in the rock, but Spike saw more. He saw Buffy's face. His sad and serene Madonna.

Tonight with fresh blood on his sword, he didn't look up to meet her stone gaze, but instead, leaned against her, asking silently for comfort. He traced fingers over the familiar damp rock of her shrine.

He was almost asleep when he felt a faint, fluttering heart beat of feeling from Buffy's rock. His eyes snapped open and he tasted a despair that did not belong to him.

TBC

banner by kazzy_cee

Jade Silk Dress

When Buffy went back inside the cave, she headed for the forbidden part of it where the jade silk dress hung silently.

She ran a rough hand over the dress and the nap caught on her fingers. When she'd gone to the party, she'd creamed her hands and feet for weeks before hand, so she'd have the hands of a town girl, smooth and soft and not hardened by working out on the Grass.

There were a couple of wrinkles near the bottom, so she smoothed them, looking at the jade color by the light of the candle she carried. It seemed so slick, like the skin of a beautiful mermaid. Something that didn't belong in her world.

"Buff."

She jumped a little at Xander's angry voice. "I just wanted to..."

His dirty hand covered her own, pulling it from the dress. She could feel his rage lighting up the room more brightly her candle. "Don't," he said. "I just want to burn the fucking thing when I find you here!"

"No!" She turned around and she knew the tears on her face weren't soothing him, but she cupped his cheek. "You spent months saving to buy me that dress--" She called up the good memories.

"Yeah, back when we both lived in cottages instead of a cave," he said bitterly. "I want to burn it."

"Please don't. It's all I have."

"After how I found you, how can you?" Xander looked sick, and Buffy flashed back to waking up the morning after the party.

Xander came to find her. She was late getting back. He lifted her in his arms and pushed down the jade silk dress to hide the blood and semen on her thighs.

........

Xander pulled out the binoculars he'd patched together with some black electrical tape. The plastic was hot against his fingers and tacky from Xander's own sweat. The sun was right overhead, which was the best time to spy on a demon gang. Any vampires would be hiding inside the tents and demons generally didn't like bright, sunny weather, which was why the Savannah continued to be the last haven for a broken humanity.

He saw a few demons sitting around a fire. Looked like they were playing cards. He pulled out his notebook of illustrations of demons he'd drawn over the years to try to keep track of the different species. These demons all had one horn on their forehead, and he wasn't sure he was familiar with them. He flipped through and the closest he could find was a two-horned creature which possessed great strength but not a lot of smarts. He remembered the night he and Buffy had hit a camp with those demons and smiled. She'd been just sixteen, and boy, could she power through them!

The walkie talkie buzzed and Xander quickly grabbed it and turned it down so the static noise wouldn't attract attention. Buff had been calling him almost hourly. He knew she was worried for him.

"Are you coming in soon?" she demanded, right away.

"Soon. The demons are one-horned on the forehead. Wearing green leather armor and they have horses. Some brands from ranches in the north quadrant."

"They hit the north pretty hard a month ago," Buffy reminded him. Xan knew she was blaming herself because that's about the time of the party.

"Slayer can't be everywhere, no matter what Giles says, Buff."

"He warned me not to go to the party."

"Right, and he's so fucking helpful!" Xander sighed, gritting his teeth, knowing how Giles' coldness still hurt her. "Looks like they have a lot of livestock and some horses. I've counted six demons, but without a closer look in the tents--"

"Please don't even think about going any closer!" He heard worry and command in her voice. "Xan?"

"I'll be careful. I just want to make sure they don't have any human slaves." Xander couldn't bear to leave anyone to the mercy of the creatures.

"I'm coming out to meet you: wait for me!"

"No, Buffy, you are too far behind. I'll be back in no time, don't worry!" He cut off the connection before she could argue further. He checked his supplies. Because he walked far on foot, he only carried the essentials, water, a bit of dried food, more water, rope, weapons, which today were a short blunt sword and a dagger, and one ragged blanket as well as some basic medical supplies in case he found someone who needed his help.

He took only what he needed and left the rest. He'd start with the cattle.

........

Spike paraded around the coliseum on a snow white mare. He waved to the crowds, his katana, wakizashi and tanto sheathed in his robes. As the crowd roared for their new champion, he looked over at Slonge, the slave master demon. Slonge and the others didn't attempt him anymore, now they'd armed him, not that he could find a way out of these caves. He'd been wandering through them for months and never felt the breath of open air. The only connection he had to his life that had been was Buffy's shrine.

He rode the placid horse under the archway and past where she was supposed to be stabled. He saw a few glances his way, but every demon knew there was no way out of the caves, so what did it matter if the Crazy One wanted to go riding through them? Not like he wouldn't be back. He had to eat and this was the only place to get his blood.

Spike patted the saddle bag he'd loaded, thinking about the crazy thing he was going to attempt and all because of a faint feather of feeling that had touched him. He guided the horse through the turnings until they came to his wall. He dismounted and pulled out what he needed, looking at the face of the Madonna he loved.

She'd kept him sane here, all these months or years--he had no idea how long he'd been in the caves since winning his soul. He traced her mouth. "I know I did wrong," he apologized, remembering how he'd scared her, and how she'd fought him on her bathroom floor. Feeling the rise of sick shame. Her stone lips remained soft under his finger tips, as if she understood him. As if she forgave what he could not.

The pic ax struck Buffy's image square in the face as Spike began to dig.

..........

Xander crawled to the second tent and found it empty. He was about to check the third when one of the horned demons got up and stretched, muttering something in his language to the others. He sniffed the air and Xander froze, aware that some demons had heightened smell. It was why he was carefully down wind of the party at the fire.

The demon scratched himself and then bent his tall head to enter the last of the tents. A minute later, he emerged dragging a nude young man. The red head blinked dull hazel eyes at the sunlight. His moon pale body was covered in black bruises and he was wearing a heavy collar and chain.

He winced away from the sunlight and the possessive touch of the demon as the creature shoved him into another tent. Xander wanted to cover his ears at the thready sound of pain and then the grunts that followed. He did not. He kept his vigil and he waited, and finally the demon emerged, adjusting his clothing.

When the demon returned safely to his card game, Xander went to the tent where the slave was, and took out his dagger. He sliced open one side of it, pulling himself inside quickly in case the other boy cried out.

Hazel eyes met his own. There was a red mark on one cheek that glistened under fresh tears. The slave cleared his throat and nodded. "Xander," he whispered, as if they were meeting in town.

Xander went to where the chain was clipped and used his dagger to pry free the lock. He didn't comment on the white fists covering the other boy's sex or the pain he saw screaming silent in his eyes. "Oz. Come with me if you want to live," he said.

********************
TBC

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Savannah, Hero in Black, Part 4

"Terminator!"

"Huh?" Xander removed his shirt and gave it to Oz. It came down to Oz's upper thighs and the way Oz smoothed it over his chest said a lot about his ordeal.

"What you said to me before: 'come with me if you want to live,' it's from the movie The Terminator."

"Yeah, I know." Once they were outside the tent, Xander and Oz crawled as fast as they could. Xander glanced back at the demons. If any of them looked in his and Oz' direction, they would see both boys easily since there was no cover other than some tall grass. "We need to move faster! If one of them... misses you."

Oz' face tightened and Xander regretted his choice of words. "Yeah, that would be bad," Oz said. "So do you have a plan?"

"Hahaha... do I have a plan, he asks!" Xander skittered forward, sweating as he expected at any moment to be spotted. Things in motion caught the gaze of any predator, and demons were exceptional hunters.

"Yeah, kinda looking for some reassurance on that score. Or you could hold my hand."

"The cattle," Xander said. "The cattle are pretty much the plan."

..........

"Bugger it!" More dust fell, coating Spike, but he wasn't making any head way. He'd been working on Buffy's wall until his back was screwed, and his hands hurt gripping the pic ax... all for a big, fat nothing. No miracle. No joy. No sudden psychic vibrations that spelled Buffy's nearness. Nothing.

"This plot needs some deus ex machina," he complained out loud.

The horse was busy eating the bits he'd brought along for her, but he'd run out of feed soon for the pair of them if he didn't find a way out of these caves. "She doesn't need you, you stupid arse!" he scolded himself.

But under everything, like the sound of the beating heart he no longer possessed, he felt her.

And so, he picked up the pic ax and continued. What the bloody else was he going to do?

..........

Buffy ran in the direction Xander had followed, using their system of little signs of tented rocks or a bit of bright cloth, to follow his trail quickly. She could track him without them, but it made it faster.

At first, she ran like the slayer she was, bounding over rocks and dried up river beds, but then she got a sudden savage stitch in her side. She ran on with one hand covering it, ignoring the tears streaming down her face from the pain.

Buffy had all kinds of experience ignoring pain.

She didn't see the bit of dead fall until she stumbled over it, and grabbed for something to break her fall, but there was only hard earth, blinding sunshine, grass, and sharp rock--

She rolled down the steep side of a slope until she snagged a stubby dead tree trunk near the bottom, and stopped her fall. She lay there, face wet with sweat and tears, bruised and puffing. Her left arm was bleeding from a long scratch, but that wasn't the worst of it: the cramp curled like forked lightning from her side to her lower tummy just above her sex. When she tried to sit up, her muscles tightened unbearably, and the low grade pain in her pelvis and lower back grew worse.

"Oh, God!" She realized something was very, very wrong.

She dug her hand into a bit of dried mud, seeing her dirty fingers grip and strain as she rode out the spasm.

........

"So... cattle. Lots of 'em." Oz looked at them, then at Xander.

"They aren't just any cattle: they are long horns."

Oz looked blank, so as he gathered up what he would need, Xander explained, "Long horns are ideal trail cattle, so that's why so many ranchers on the Savannah have them. They can take the dry, and they can defend themselves--see the horns on that steer?" Xander pointed to a large animal grazing below with long legs, and a lanky body. Its narrow face seemed to possess a sullen expression, and the long horns that swept out horizontally, gave it a sinister look. "Tough looking dudes, huh? Most important for us, when they stampede, they hold together better than other cattle."

"You did some cowboying in your time."

"A bit, but no one will hire me now," Xander said.

"Hope you won't take this the wrong way, but shouldn't we be running away?" Oz glanced back toward the demon tents.

"We wouldn't get far before they missed you and tracked us. No where to hide out here but the Grass," Xander said absently.

"What's that?" Oz was looking at the long tube of rough clay and rolled up newspaper in Xander's hands. Xander was mixing some powders from little pouches he'd taken from his pockets and hurriedly placing them in the sections of the tube between clay dividers.

"Homemade roman candle: sulphur, wood charcoal from our fire pit, and saltpeter--you probably know it from science classes before the school closed as potassium nitrate, plus a few other things."

From the camp in the dip below them, both boys heard shouting. Oz' escape had been discovered by the demon on horseback who watched the cattle.

........

Buffy gave up on being brave. She curled up and sobbed, only when she moved to curl, that hurt, and it hurt to stay straight, and it hurt to do anything, even breathe and cry.

Her skirt was damp above her sex, so she lifted it and saw her thighs were spotted with watery blood stains. What was happening to her?

........

"That's going to help us, right?" Oz' voice was higher than normal, something Xander had never heard from him before.

"Yeah, I hope." Xander sealed up the tube and pulled out a match box. The demons were running from the tents in all directions, looking for a sign of the boy's trail: they'd find it very soon since the crushed grass was easy to spot.

"Hurry."

"Doin' it. Hang on!"

Xander sent the tube rolling down the hill and lit the long fuse.

There was a shout from below: they'd been spotted.

"Now we run, c'mon!" Xander grabbed Oz' arm and they peeled off west of the camp.

Behind them, they could hear the approaching hoof beats of the demon on horseback.

Then, there was a sudden staccato series of explosions behind them, one after another, Crack! Crack! After a pause, heavy with the feeling of impending disaster, the sound of thunder suddenly erupted below them: the herd of long horns was stampeding!

Xander reached the little dip he'd made note of when scouting, and yanked Oz into it with him. "Give it a sec!"

Oz wiped sweat from his face with shaking hands. "Xander, your plan?"

They heard screams of horses and demons and cattle now. The sounds of things tearing, falling, and then all was thunder and the ground itself trembled from the sudden impact.

"What?" Xander yelled, daring to raise his head and look back.

"Is a scary plan."

"Get down!" Xander grabbed Oz and shoved him deeper into the crevice, sheltering him with his own body as beside them clods of dry mud exploded under sharp hooves which dug in and blurred past...

.........

Buffy thought at first that the sound was her own heart beat, or an approaching storm. She sat up weakly and her eyes saucered as she made out a herd of stampeding cattle headed directly for her! There was no cover, no place to hide--

She got up and forced herself to try to run, but she was dizzy, weak--

She wasn't going to make it!

She didn't hear him over the approaching cattle, but suddenly a white horse and rider came up along side her. She saw the wide eyes of the horse, foam along its neck, and above a rider in a long black coat and hat, his hands covered in leather gloves, and his face hidden under cloth wrappings, excepting a narrow strip where she glimpsed blue, burning eyes.

"Hurry!" he yelled.

Despite the warning tingle up her back that this stranger all in black was dangerous, she took his hand and leaped on the horse behind him, grabbing his narrow hips and holding on as the horse wheeled under his sure hands and then cut north to get out of the path of the oncoming stampede in a blur of wind and dust.

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

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Savannah, Vignettes of Tenderness

Despite the fire which was small enough you could piss it out, Oz was shivering.

Xander kept glancing at him, feeling this bizarro urge to care for him that felt... rusty. He cared for Buffy, and if it had been Buffy shivering, he'd have pulled her into his arms and let her use his lap as a pillow, put the blanket over her, and stroked her hair.

Xander was used to Buffy: she was pretty tight about showing emotion. Kind of like a dog Xander had as a pet once, which wanted touch, but stiffened at every caress, until it went and sat somewhere to absorb the affection from a safe distance. Buffy was like that dog, though, of course, he'd never tell her she reminded him of an actual dog. Uh. He just didn't think she'd get it.

Now Xander was feeling out of sorts, because he could see Oz was suffering, but he didn't know how to deal with it.

Xander felt like the rusty garden gate outside his old cottage. It stiffened up on its hinges after one rainy season, and hadn't wanted to open, so he'd had to work it for a while to get it moving freely again. Now he felt just like that gate: if he let Oz in, could he shut him out again?

He settled for tossing the blanket at Oz.

"You don't have a shirt on!" Oz immediately tried to give it back.

"Yeah, but I've been eating regular and you... I could walk up your spine like stairs."

Oz pulled the blanket close, his eyes closing for a moment as he rubbed his face against the rough comfort of wool.

"Besides, I should really keep watch. Just... go to sleep!" Xander barked.

Oz didn't seem to take offence, just studying Xander calmly.

Xander felt self-conscious and blocked out the other boy as he pulled his equipment out of his traveling sack.

"What's that?" Oz asked him.

"Leather bracelet. I make them for market day."

Oz inched over closer so he could see better. Xander watched his face, but didn't see anything there but honest interest.

"I inset a little stone into the center of each bracelet. This is a piece of turquoise. Not a great stone... see where it’s flawed?" He showed Oz, whom traced a tiny crack in the face of the gem.

"Looks like a map of the world, kinda," Oz said.

"Yeah, that's why I like turquoise." Then Xander wondered if that sounded strange. Saying how much he liked a stone. He cleared his throat. "I sell it, anyway. Some girls like to buy them for their fellas."

"That is so cool. I like the little spirals and designs on the leather. It looks like it was made by a machine, all those laces threaded through... and the setting, how do you do that?"

Xander flipped it over, showing a piece of leather backing which he'd sew around the stone. The face wasn't as wide, so it would keep the piece from falling out.

"It’s not anything special," Xander said gruffly.

"I think it is." Oz wasn't looking at the stone, but at Xander.

Xander swallowed, feeling an urge to slam shut his rusty gate. "You need to sleep. Now," he ordered.

"Xander. I'm going to lie next to you 'cause I can see my breath."

Xander nodded reluctant permission and watched out of the corner of his eyes as Oz sidled close and curled up in his blanket next to him. The feel of the smaller boy's body was a little oblong bit of warmth on a cold night.

He picked up the leather and went back to work. If he made a few more of these, he could maybe afford some of that shampoo Buffy liked, and maybe a couple of other things she needed but wouldn't ask for.

.........

"Easy, girl." Buffy came out of her daze when the stranger in black lifted her gently off the horse. She saw it had somehow gotten dark. When had that happened?

Buffy's legs were numb and as soon as she stood on them, she felt it in her back and her lower belly. She couldn't stifle a gasp, falling at the stranger's feet like a toppled tree.

"Fuck!" He dropped to his knees beside her, his gloved hands fluttering.

"We don't want her kind stayin' here," Buffy heard a harsh female voice. She was holding her tummy, tears running down her face. She looked up and recognized the inn keeper for the Pony Express glaring at her under tangled grey hair, which had the texture of unwashed sheep.

"What?" Her rescuer stood. He was smaller than the big woman: at least two inches shorter, yet there was something menacing about him with his gloves, turban and hat, all different shades of midnight. The woman blinked, taking a step back.

"I don't want her in my place. We're respectable here."

"She needs help."

"So what?"

He strode close and the woman gave a squeak. "I want a room. Hot water. And I'll need some food and things to care for her," he said in a gentle voice, yet the sound of it made Buffy's hair stiff on the back of her neck.

"You can have the cabin out back! I'll send the girl around--"

"Do it."

..........

He carried Buffy out back. She meant to walk, but she was weak and hurting... and scared.

Her hands cupped her belly, and she wondered if her problem was gone. She wondered how she could mourn the loss of something she hadn't chosen or wanted.

"What's wrong, pet?" his voice was gentle as he laid her on the single bed with a worn star patchwork quilt. The walls were fat logs with tar between them lit by a single lamp by the bed.

"I've lost..." Buffy's voice cracked and died, like a shred of fragile paper evaporating in fire.

"No. Your baby is still there." He took off his rough gloves, revealing surprisingly delicate white hands which covered her own on her tummy. Buffy was shocked at this sudden intimacy.

The servant arrived then with hot water and food which Buffy didn't want, so she couldn't question her rescuer privately.

...........

Xander got up when he heard hoof beats on the Grass. He couldn't make out where they were coming from, but he dosed the tiny fire immediately, smothering it with his boots and Oz' blanket to trap the smell of the smoke.

He saw the whites of Oz' eyes in the moonlight.

"Stay here," he ordered, pulling something from his sack before he circled away from the camp.

...........

"My baby...?"

"Still there, pet. Don't fret." The stranger stood and looked at the servant girl. "I want you should clean her up."

The girl shook her head and Buffy's rescuer snagged her arm, twisting it a little and bringing her close to him. "I wasn't askin.’"

He strode from the cabin, slamming the door, and Buffy felt weirdly vulnerable, considering she didn't know who he was, and he made danger dance down her spine, but she didn't want the servant girl touching her any more than the girl wanted to do it.

She turned her face away when the girl bought over the pan of hot water and a sea sponge, and began to open Buffy's dirty shirt.

.........

The one horned demon rode in almost over top of Oz. Oz scrambled away, but he knew even before he was tackled it was futile. He should have known that K'sees would search for him: Oz wore his brand on his inner thigh.

The demon dragged him back to the camp by his hair, and Oz went as limp in his hands as a mouse caught by a hawk, knowing it was hopeless. At least Xander got away...

The frail cotton tee shirt was ripped off him and he turned his face away as it was slammed into the dirt. He knew what was coming, and he pressed his eyes closed to stop the tears--

Suddenly there was a sound like an axe cutting wood. K'sees stiffened over him. He choked, greenish blood frothing from his lips, before turning to confront something... or someone.

In the moonlight, Oz looked up at Xander holding a dripping tomahawk.

Xander used it on the demon like he was cutting kindling. More blood sprayed, hitting Oz' face as he stared in awe.

"You okay?" Xander asked calmly. His hand holding the weapon was steady. It was hard to believe this was the awkward Xander Oz had known growing up.

Oz threw himself into Xander's arms.

Then, just as suddenly as it had happened, the lightning-hug was safely over, and Oz was four feet away.

"S-sorry. Normal programming will now resume. Just... not sure I could have taken being raped again." Oz' voice cracked over the word rape.

Xander cleared his throat. "I feel like a real hero now," he joked, bending over to wipe the gory tomahawk off on the still-twitching demon corpse.

"That's probably because you are one," Oz said, then in one of his abrupt changes of topic, he continued, "Potato chips. I could really go for some right now."

Xander looked at Oz, still obviously a little wary, but there was no resumption of the unsettling Ozonian cuddle fest.

"I prefer rice chips, but with cheese. I have to watch what I eat."

"You kiddin' me? You look like you burn a lot of calories out here."

Xander laughed, easy again. "Yeah, I think I burned a few just now."

........

Her mysterious rescuer returned on the heels of the servant girl leaving. Buffy blinked at him, so tired she just wanted to sleep, but she felt safer now he was back... which made no sense!

Wordlessly, he took off his hat, and unwound the turban, revealing an unevenly shaped pointy chin first, and then pouty lips, followed by the brown bristles of a light beard. His hair was crazy curls of mixed brown and white. His eyes were searing, but not the blue she'd thought. Sort of an odd mixy color, and the searing intensity came from the intent way he gazed back at her, as if she were the only thing in the room.

It made her swallow, abruptly self-conscious. He took off his black coat, revealing black jeans and a black shirt, open at the collar.

"You'll be alright if you rest. Not sure how you ended up out here... or why you're pregnant, Buffy," he said, eyes shadowed.

Buffy frowned, fed up with all the mystery. "Who the hell are you?"

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Who the hell are you? Buffy demanded.

Bitch! Spike thought.

Here he was, her fucking hero... and okay, what he did to her sits uneasy, like a stack of plates that might at any moment topple, leaving shards everywhere to cut the soft parts, but this...? This was just too much!

"I haven't fucking been gone that long!"

She blinked. "I have no idea who you are! And if you don't want to lose those fingers? Get. Them. Off. Me."

Spike blinked. "But you're Buffy. You smell like her... look like her. And you're a bitch, so that's my Buffy... OW!"

He rubbed his cheek and backed off. "Can hit like her too!"

"How 'bout this? You helped me so I don't kill you. Now get out!" She made to sit up, but then whimpered in pain.

"Sit down!"

"No!" She shoved bedding away, he shoved it back. Off, on. Off, on. Until Spike rolled his eyes and sat on her legs.

"This is even more farcical then the sex, pet."

"Sex?" Her forehead crinkled and she gave him that disgusted look he loved. Why he loved it, he had no fucking idea, but he must get off on being unloved, given his history with Angelus, Dru, and now this bitch he loved.

"I'm being sensitive and not smacking you like I want to, so cut it!"

She didn't look impressed.

"Haven't asked you who knocked you up, have I, or who do I hunt down and kill? Could go on about Riley--"

"You know Riley?" Her beautiful eyes widened and studied him as if fascinated. As if he were a mystery, when it was plain to anyone with sense that he was ordinary Spike and she was flying a few feathers short.

"Yeeeeah. Soldier boy come back long enough to leave something domestic in the nest?" He hissed out the last word, remembering how Riley had humiliated him and she'd gone along with it.

"I... I don't... Nest?"

"OUCH! Why do you keep picking on me? I'm only trying to get the story!"

"You're... crude!"

"Well, someone diddled you, didn't they? Just don't tell me it was Angel. I know he took your cherry, but his soldiers have to be as dead as he is!"

...

"You know Angel?" The crease was back. Spike wanted to caress it away. Wanted to be tender with her. Dark circles under her eyes and her hands over her belly as if to keep inside of it the child she carried... but he knew better then to try. Buffy was an even worse bitch when she was hurting. Likely to smack a bloke down for daring to touch any wounds she was nursing...

Spike rolled his eyes. "Yesss. Tell me, pet. How many fingers am I holding up?"

She swatted him for the one he used. Seemed she at least remembered that much about sign language.

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

"Man, how do you walk this far every day?" Oz collapsed on his ass, wiping his forehead. Xander stayed on his feet, chewing on some dried meat he handed Oz, but his brown eye scanned the horizon and his very alertness spooked Oz a little.

"Used to it, I guess." Xander shrugged it off.

"One thing about being a sex slave, they kept me in a cage. Not a lot of walking."

"Don't even try to make a joke about it, Oz, okay?" Xander turned away.

"Um, okay, I kind of have to do that. I don't know how else to deal with what happened to me. I mean, when we get back I could lie and say I ran off to the circus, but I'm thinking that won't wash."

Xander sighed. "I'm sorry. I'm no one's therapist. I just... don't know how to react."

"To what?"

"To what happened to you... which I still don't know and I'm frankly not sure I want to."

"Daily rape and humiliation and wanting to kill myself pretty much skims the highlights. Plus? My hands shake sometimes until I remind myself over and over that I'm... safe. Only my body doesn't seem to get that yet."

"I wonder why they kept you alive that long?" Xander gave Oz a sharp look. "Most humans they sell to the demon slave markets and they have a short shelf life."

Oz looked away and swallowed. "They really liked me, I guess."

Xander frowned, sensing for the first time that Oz was holding something back, but before he could push, the slighter boy stood. He was wearing a dish towel around his head to keep the sun from taking too much moisture away and the blanket was cut up and wrapped around him like a rough kilt, pinned over one boney hip, which still bore faint bruises. The blanket was a waste anyway, because it had a big melted hole in the middle from Xander using it the other night to douse their fire.

"I really want to just... shut down, but the only way to get back to your cave is to keep walking, I'm thinking," Oz said.

Xander nodded, letting the smaller boy walk ahead, but as he did, Xander studied him from behind. There was something up with Oz, he could feel it, and Xander didn't like mysteries. Bit you in the ass at exactly the worst moment.

He'd be watching Oz.

.........

She fell asleep like a child, almost mid argument.

Spike sighed, aching and pissed off.

What he wanted was to fight with her until she made everything clear again. This world was so strange, and Buffy... was her hair longer then it had been the last time he'd seen her? It had been short and sassy then, but now it looked a bit like that first year she'd been in college...

How could she not know who he was?

He rubbed his forehead, staring at her from across the room, nursing resentment and hurt feelings and the screaming need to possess he had clamped down in a forbidden jar.

His Artemis, she was.

Excepting she was knocked up.

Who had gotten close enough to manage that?

........

She woke up just as fast as she fell asleep. Blinked at him where he sat in the shadows, watching her.

"My baby?" In her eyes he saw brief panic and vulnerability followed by that aloneness that always made him want to smash something to get to her. Just... get to her.

"Fine, pet."

"I dreamed I lost her."

"Her?"

"In my dreams it's a little girl."

"That's..." He cleared his throat. "Very sweet."

She smiled, her lips still the same color almost as her skin. "You don't actually mean that... uh, do you have a name?"

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Savannah, Betrayed

"So you do know I'm a vampire, right?" Spike was nodding off. He was across the room from her highness since she didn't want him too close. Even if the silly bint couldn't remember him, she was her usual snuggly self.

"Yeah. So?"

That made him blink awake. "So if you can't remember me, how do you know I'm good?" Ha! Take that, slayer!

"What does that matter?" She frowned, rubbing her tummy again. So much of her focus was on her body now. She constantly shaped her flat tummy with her fingers and he wondered if being The Slayer, she could hear the heart beat of her own fetus, as he could. She smelled ripe to him as well, ripe and female and... grrrr.

He was getting a woody from thinking about eating her out. Probably best not to think about it.

"Well, I could eat sweet blond girlie for breakfast."

"No, you wouldn't," her voice was weary.

He almost mentioned the chip, and how it hadn't worked ever since he'd been in the caves, but if she didn't know him, then would she remember that? "My head might split open from more strangeness, but why not?"

"How can you not know that?"

"How can you not know me?"

"Are we going to argue again about how I should know you? Because I don't." She rolled her eyes.

"So you say." He wanted to pout about it, but she was glaring at him, making him feel childish.

"Whatever. You talk a lot."

He decided to let that one pass since he was trying to figure out what was happening. "Didn't you feel anything when you saw me? Some kind of... recognition."

She pressed her lips together, remembering that tingle of danger down her spine, but she wasn't going to share that with him, or the way she was feeling it now. Even when she was sleeping, she sensed how she was the focus of his attention. It was... unsettling.

"Okay, let me spell it out for you since you don't seem too bright," she said, ignoring how he opened his mouth to argue with her. "Pure demons don't like half breeds much, so they usually enslave your kind. Vampires work with us now to survive on the Grass. Most of the ones I know are escaped slaves from the Scourge."

"The Scourge... I've heard of that. It's bad."

"Well... duh."

"Fighting like this?" Spike decided to rattle her since she was pissing him off. "Gets me hard." He rubbed a hand over the long, bent shape under his jeans and smirked when she couldn't help but look.

"You're disgusting! I'm... pregnant."

"Yeah, but you are one hot mama, slayer."

Her answer was a thrown pillow.

.........

Oz knew what he had to do.

It was dark now, and because he was so out of shape they'd had to stop for the night. Xander had gone out to scout around.

Oz was shivering because they couldn't risk a fire.

He looked over the ridge and could see the silhouette of black buildings against the lighter sky line. From one of them, lights moved, and he caught the faint sounds of voices.

Demons.

It was the burned out shell of a town, attacked by demons five years ago. Now demons lived in there, coming out of hiding from abandoned homes to hunt anything that got close.

Oz closed his eyes, trying not to imagine that every silken sound of the moving grass was stealthy footsteps of some thing coming to take him away. Lock him in a cage. Drag him out and tear inside him--

Xander came back, and Oz saw coolness in his soft brown eye when he looked at Oz. Oz wasn't sure how, but somehow he'd screwed up and now Xander suspected something.

He rubbed his face. He felt as worn as a dirty crease in old paper.

He ached for a friend.

For a fragile few hours, Xander had been one, but now it was over.

"I'm hungry," he asked softly, his throat tight.

"Oh, man, I'm sorry!" There was an instant apology in Xander's eye. "I'll dig in my supplies."

Oz waited until Xander was bent over his bag before he brought the big rock in his fist crashing down on the back of Xander's skull.

...........

Spike relaxed against the side of the cabin where Buffy was sleeping. He couldn't sleep, so he'd taken a moment to himself.

He couldn't make sense of things, and he was also feeling guilty for being so... pushy after what he'd done to her. Even though she didn't remember. He closed his eyes, wondering if that was better or worse. If she remembered, she'd hate him like he hated himself, but if she didn't know what he'd tried to do... was that better or worse?

He couldn't decide.

Wished he had a cigarette to figure on it.

"Spike?"

"Ahhh!" He jumped as a cloaked figure loomed near. "Who are you?"

A skeletal hand clasped a gnarled walking stick. Spike couldn't catch a scent. It was like the figure was nothing but air. He couldn't smell it or hear a heartbeat, which was why it had managed to sneak up on him.

It wasn't alive.

"I've come to give you these." A couple of leather and silver bands were held out by one hand that looked like flesh saran-wrapped over bone.

"Uh, lovely." Spike made no move to touch the offering. "How'd you know my name? No one here seems to?"

"That doesn't matter!" said the impatient voice. "It's not like you're clever enough to figure things out, now is it? Or maybe I should draw a picture for you."

Spike grabbed the mysterious figure's hood, which he almost expected his hand to go through, as it would a ghost, and shoved it back, revealing a ravaged face with one hazel eye glaring at him, affronted, while the other was an opaque milky color. A scar ran through that ruined eye, bisecting one tufted eye brow and continuing down a weathered cheek.

"Giles?"

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The Champion

"Ow!"

"I'm sorry, did that hurt?" Oz put down the rock and rubbed at the back of Xander's neck, where he'd managed to bash him.

"Well, let's see... YEAH!"

"It always looked simple on TV."

"What, braining and betraying your friend?"

Oz swallowed, his shaking hand dropped the rock and he pulled his knees in. "Yeah. All my lessons in violence are pretty much of the couch potato variety... that is, until lately."

Xander took a deep breath. He wanted to slug Oz or just leave him here, but his spider senses were telling him he'd hit gold with what Oz was concealing... not that his neck felt any better.

"Okay, talk. And after that, I expect a major neck rub!"

Oz laughed, and then the laughter was choked off by tears. Both boys ignored that.

"I don't know where to start... but I can't go back with you. I can't!"

Xander stared at Oz. There were only a few reasons why Oz couldn't return to one of the towns. None of them were good.

"So... what are you?"

"I'm a werewolf. Sometimes. You know, when there's a full moon?"

Xander nodded. "Explains why you survived so long as their--" he broke off, not sure how to say it.

Oz was playing with the rock he'd tried to brain Xander with. "Yeah." He cleared his throat. "Also, pretty sure I'm gay."

Xander swallowed. "Yeah, that's bad." He squeezed his eyes shut so he couldn't picture finding Jesse's body. After a minute he was back, and able to focus on Oz again... who had clammed up.

...

"Is that it? I mean, bashing me on the head because you're a gay werewolf... that's bad television, Oz."

"No. That's not it."

...

"Well?" Xander was getting crabby. Pulling story out of Oz was like eating rice with tweezers.

Oz stood, his thin body looked so frail that the endless prairie wind seemed like it could blow him away at any moment, like a pale bundle of bone, dried up into tumbleweed. His fingers were shaking as he opened the blanket, revealing a brown tuft of pubic hair and his soft sex. Xander opened his mouth to tell him off for offering himself, when Oz spread his legs and put a hand on his inner thigh, displaying a mark.

The brand of a traitor.

"Oh... Shit." Xander scrubbed his hair. Now his fingers were shaking.

"Go on, say it: tell me to go back to them: how I belong to them now because of what I've done."

"What have you done?" Xander's voice was as smooth and as fragile as ice.

"That town down there, for one: I'm the one who opened the gates to let the demons in," Oz whispered.

........

"Giles... what happened to you?" Spike didn't take the two leather and silver rings from Giles, who frowned, looking pissy. At least that hadn't changed.

"I'm not your Giles. Spike, I must say: you are dense."

"Oi! I managed to save your slayer from getting squashed and found us some digs."

Giles sighed, the sound hollow, as if he were an empty cadaver. It kind of gave Spike the creeps, though he was loath to admit it. "Look like you've been skipping some meals. How 'bout you come inside, and I'll set you up?"

"I don't have time to share bread and salt. Here, take these!"

Reluctantly, Spike took the bands. "What are they?"

"Something to fight the Horsemen with, when they find you."

"Well, that clears that mystery up," Spike quipped. "Can you tell me... where am I?"

"You made a wish to be with her, since you still think yourself worthy, so the universe conspired to send you to the slayer who most needed you."

"So... she's not my Buffy?"

"No. Christ, you're thick."

Spike growled, but didn't argue further. This Giles was on the menacing side, so who knew what he'd do if he got cranky. Best not to find out. "So what's with the Gandalf look?"

"Mind if I sit while I spell it out? I'm... tired." Giles went over to a stump of wood and sat down gracefully, spreading his dark woolen cloak. Spike noticed a faint tattoo of spirals across one side of Giles' cheek as well as a single silver earring sparkling in his left ear. He was a wee bit different from Sunnydale Giles, that's sure.

"Okay, spill..."

"You must protect Buffy."

"Doin' it."

"No, I should have said: protect her child. In the scheme of things, she doesn't matter. She's only a vessel."

"Say that again, and I'll have to hurt you!"

"Spike, don't bristle up like a tom cat. I went to a lot of trouble to ensure her pregnancy, and no, thanks for the flattering look of repulsion, I am not the father!"

"Thank balls for that. Who is?"

"You'll find out in time."

"Long as it isn't Angel. So this... alternative dimension. That's like when Kirk met his evil twin on Star Trek, right?"

"Star Trek?"

"Guess you didn't have much time for telly, what with the mage trip."

"I am a mage, yes." Giles stood. He rubbed a skeleton hand over his face. "I have to go. Only three got through, and I must keep the gate closed on the rest."

"Three?"

"The Horsemen."

"Oh. Sounds bad."

"The worst... They exist only to find her, and to kill her before she gives birth to her child."

Spike felt a cold shiver run down his spine. He didn't like this dimension much. No telly or comfy chair. It was all endlessly moving grass and sour-faced inhabitants.

"Spike: this world belongs to the demons. Here, the slayers are losing. Do you understand?"

Spike nodded. He'd had a sense of that. "There's so much I don't follow. Why that woman treated Buffy the way she did... and how come I haven't met myself here? Don't I have a twin... uh, brother, or whatever?"

"You do," Giles picked up his staff.

"So where is he... I mean, me?"

"You are dead in this dimension, of course." Giles said.

...

"Put the bands on only when you must: their power signature will draw the Horsemen to you otherwise."

"Why me, Giles?"

"Because you are her once and future champion." Giles put a hand on Spike's shoulder, a familiarity which spoke of last stands and brothers in arms. It gave Spike the willies. "Protect her, no matter what. And believe in yourself. You are her destined champion. Her child must live. The fate of not only our world, but the many worlds relies upon it..."

"How do I kill these horsemen?"

"You can't," Giles said unhelpfully. "But I'm sure I can trust you to improvise."

"Giles, wait!" Spike yelled as Giles' figure rippled, devoured by white flames. Then disappeared, leaving Spike with more questions than answers and a burning fear in his gut.

Giles was wrong.

The universe was wrong.

He wasn't worthy.

He wasn't her champion.

.......

She woke up when he returned, and he saw she'd been sick again in the pail he'd left for her. He found himself at her bedside, kneeling there like her knight, which he knew was ridiculous. "I'll get you some water," he said. He reached out and stroked the hair back from her face.

No one will hurt this girl, he thought.

"Thanks... I don't know why you're so nice to me, but..." her voice trailed off, and he saw under all her fire a familiar weariness. One girl in all the world.

He got up, got her water, and held her up so she could drink it. "I dreamed something was coming. Something bad. And they took my baby." Her hands rubbed her tummy.

"Shhhh. Back to sleep. Just a dream, pet."

"I still don't know if I trust you," she grumped.

He smiled, and watched as her eyes fluttered closed and she fell back into her dreams. He hoped they'd be happier.

Her hand was still clasped in his. Somehow she'd forgotten to pull it away, back to herself.

"No one will hurt you or your baby, Buffy," Spike whispered.

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Xander had his head against the grass. His fingers clenched in the reddish, loose soil. "Hear it?"

Oz shook his head. "I don't hear anything."

"Put your head down against the earth. Feel it vibrating..." Xander watched as Oz bent down and mimicked him. When Oz' eyes flared open, he knew the other boy had heard it.

"Like... drum beats."

"It's a siege. North Town. Must be."

Oz paled. "Please... please just let me go."

"Where will you go, Oz? You can't even survive out here on your own. You might be a werewolf, but being a sex slave for months hasn't really prepared you for survival on The Grass."

Oz's fingers clenched on bone wheat strands of grass in his fingers. "You don't understand who you're helping. I've done things..."

Xander handed some dried meat to the other boy. "When you're ready, you'll tell me, but until then, I'm going to go with... my heart, I guess. C'mon. We can make North Town at dusk."

"You want to head toward a town under siege?"

"Yep," Xander checked his sack. "Might have to stop for some more supplies on the way there."

"Supplies?"

"You'll see."

"Xander?"

"Yeah?"

"You are out-taciturning me. Stop it."

Xander grinned and then he reached out with grimy fingers and ruffled Oz' sleep-crushed hair. Before Oz could think about how it felt, that friendly touch, the hand was gone and Xander was walking the Grass again.

Oz got up on his feet and followed.

...

"Are you all right up there, girl?"

"I'm not your girl," was Buffy's only comment.

Oh, yes, you are, Spike thought, but he settled for a smug smile, knowing it would irritate her. Truth was, he was worried for her. She was still pale, and he didn't like making her travel again, but Giles had said someone would be coming for her... it made him uneasy, and he wanted to leave the Inn.

"Taking that whore outta here? Good!" The Inn keeper said, as she came out to watch Spike help Buffy onto his mare.

Without pausing, Spike turned on his heel and strode over to the woman, backhanding her.

"Spike!" Buffy cried out in shock.

He stood over the woman, who blinked at him in shock. "She is not a whore. Call her that again and I'll hear of it, and I'll pull your still-beating heart out through your nostrils."

"She's carrying a baby from when she lay down for all those men. Everyone knows it!"

Spike's jaw tightened. All those men? He glanced over his shoulder at Buffy, but she looked away, her face even paler in the darkening light.

"She is carrying my baby. Mine. And she is to be my wife. Treat her with respect, woman, and make sure you put the word out: I'll kill anyone who insults my wife."

The woman's eyes saucered.

Spike wanted to strike her again but a gentle, firm hand caught his own. It was Buffy. He saw her head was still bent and it pissed him off. Why did these people treat her this way? She was Buffy. She was his warrior queen.

He lifted her pale hand to his lips and then, as courtly as a knight, dropped to his knees. "Marry me, Buffy," he asked.

Her shamed shyness evaporated. "You're insane!"

"Insane with love over your, uh, sweetness, my dove."

"Cut that out!" She shook off his hand and marched back to the horse, and Spike followed. "So where do we live?" he asked her as he helped her gently back astride.

"You're a lunatic: we don't live anywhere, but I should get back to the caves and find Xander."

"Xander? Perfect. So you spend your time rescuing that useless puppy in this universe as well?"

...

The dull thuds of explosions sounded like Xander's firecrackers to Oz, but the grass hill was lit with the red and gold of flame over the horizon. A tracer flew through the sky like a heavy comet and fell beyond sight, impacting with a yellow boom!

Xander put an arm around Oz, looting through his bag with the other for his tomahawk.

Oz stared at him. Xander had his arm around him! What did that mean? Oz was a pariah. No human should want to touch him, with the things he'd done. His throat tightened, because he knew that one day soon Xander would know about Oz' past, and when he did, he'd use that tomahawk on Oz, not... comfort him as he would a friend.

"Shhhh, Oz, man, you are so serious."

"I didn't say anything."

"I'm adept at reading Oz-silence now. I'm going down there to even out the odds a little. I want you to stay here, okay?"

Oz shook his head. "No, please, don't go down there. North Town is surrounded by demons!"

"I can get around the skirmishers and plant a few surprises. C'mon, I'll show you. If you know what I'm going to do, it will be easier for you to wait."

Xander pulled a reluctant Oz to the top of the rise. "See those guns they have?

Oz blinked as he saw a puff of white smoke rise from one and then a ball shoot from it. About five seconds after the canon lit off, he heard the boom as it impacted the wooden stockade around North Town. He saw defenders up on the heights, their own canons lighting off, so that tracer sound filled the air.

"They're using six pounders. Can tell since there are five cannoneers, and they are getting off a shot every four minutes or so. They aren't close enough yet to really do much damage. Have to be at least a kilometer before they can really gut the walls."

"Xander... what are you going to do?"

"Spike some guns. A little salt, a little magic. Stay here."

"You... trust me not to betray you?"

"Well, yeah. And don't try to run off again because I'll have to follow and make sure you're all right. It'll make me cranky. But, if you do need to, there is more meat in the sack. Take it."

Oz blinked, and his eyes were watering from more then the haze in the air. "Please be careful," he finally said.

Xander gave a reckless grin. "Always am!"

...

"How could you tell her that it was your baby?" Buffy asked Spike later that night. He was riding to her instructions, guided by starlight. The only sound was the lonely, endlessly moving wind over the prairie. He thought his girl must be different from the Buffy he'd known from living with that wind alone: it was such a desolate sound. Made a body feel futile and small.

"I grew up a Victorian gentleman in a man's world: seems like it's a bit like that here. Figured I could offer you the protection of my name and then the hens would leave off."

Buffy had her face snuggled against the cloak over his back. Her hands were laced over his tummy. She was very tired, he knew. "I don't need to be protected," she said. Her voice sounded of as many shades of sadness as a sunset had color. Spike's hand tightened protectively over hers, conscious of the beating heart of her baby as she let herself rest against him.

"Don't care."

"I'm gonna sleep some more, okay?" She leaned closer and her head came to rest between his neck and back, and at that moment, he fell for her. Her. Not the Buffy he knew, but this strange, prickly elsewhere-Buffy, with all her secret pain.

Love feels no burden,
thinks nothing of trouble,
attempts what is above its strength,
pleads no excuse of impossibility...
It is therefore able to undertake all things,
and it completes many things,
and warrants them to take effect,
where he who does not love would faint and lie down.
Love is watchful and sleeping, slumbereth not.
Though weary, it is not tired;
though pressed, it is not straitened;
though alarmed, it is not confounded-Thomas A. Kempis

"This? This is where you're living, Slayer?" Spike looked around at the cave Buffy shared with Xander.

"Yeah, so?" She felt shame flush her cheeks as she remembered the pretty cottage she'd been evicted from. Remembered the townspeople chasing Xander into the night with lit torches. She closed her eyes, pushing the specter of that night away like the empty gown of the person she'd once been.

"It's a fuckin' hovel!" Spike kicked her favorite cooking pan.

"Hey!" She reached down and righted it, feeling her weariness and dizziness return.

Spike frowned, seeing her holding her side. "You alright?"

"Yes!" She held out a hand to ward him off if he tried to hold her again. The truth was, a huge part of her wanted him to hold her, wanted to be crushed against cool leather and Spike, her mysterious, brassy peacock of a rescuer, but she couldn't trust anyone but Xan. Everyone else had deserted her or turned away from her shame. "Just keep your distance!"

"Oh, please. You're about as appealing as rotting liver!" he growled.

"I am so much more appealing than...ewwww!" She covered her mouth. "Now you've done it!" She raced for the outside, bending over--

Spike was there seconds later, putting a damp cloth against her forehead as she retched romantically into the shrubbery.

She tensed when he discovered her tears, but all he did was smooth them away under compassionate thumbs.

She didn't let herself shed anymore.

"I'll take a look round. See if I can scrounge up some food for your precious cooking pot."

She knew if she only let him, he'd swing her into his arms like her knight. Carry her inside and put her safely under linen sheets.

Instead, he surprised her, dropping his hands and his gaze.

"Fresh air will do you good. Stay out here while I manage something."

She nodded, accepting this limited service, which was exactly all she could bring herself accept.

When he disappeared inside her cave, she wondered how he knew her limitations so well, as if she were familiar ground and his feet already knew the best path to tread.

...

He brought her soup later. She was sitting looking up at the stars, something everyone did on the Grass. He passed her a bowl of soup and she ate, suddenly hungry with the perversity of her pregnancy.

"What am I to you?" she asked him as she sipped.

He was cleaning his blades, his face heavy as if from the weight of carrying such weapons. It was something she understood.

"You'll think I'm mad," he said.

"Probably."

He laughed, the sound rattling with the unease of disuse.

"I owed a debt for...for hurtin' someone. Payin' it, I got lost. But there was this rock with an...image on it. Called it my Madonna."

"Madonna?" Buffy finished her soup and put down her spoon. "It was a pregnant image?"

Spike cocked his head. "I think maybe she was. I didn't see it because I was looking for my own Artemis. Instead, fortune tossed me at the feet of the knocked-up version. Guess you needed me more than she did, pet."

Buffy rubbed her belly. "It's hard for me to believe it myself, sometimes, and I'm the one with the kid."

"You don't glow, you know, or any of that nonsense."

"Why would I glow?" Buffy frowned. "I don't want to be pregnant. I just am."

"Will you tell me how it happened?" He really wanted to know. Would she let him read some of the closed pages?

"The thing is," she confessed softly, looking up at the stars. "I really don't know what happened. I just woke up...pregnant."

"Oh." He stared at her. "Well, it's happened once, legend has it."

"No, not like that." Her face darkened like a sad and resigned moon goddess. He ached to hold her but there might as well be flames burning between them, warding him off. She was wary and he was unworthy. What a pair they were!

In the celestial whirl above them, clouds breathed past as he waited on her words.

Finally, she said softly, "That night...someone had been with me." She scrubbed her cheek with the back of her hand. "Or...maybe more than one. It kind of looked like...more than one."

"Fucking hell!" Spike sprang to his feet, his fists balled.

...

Xander sprinted over the deforested earth. It had been raining, so the grass and the mud and the remains of trees made a fine mess to navigate. He watched a pair of oxen pulling a six-pounder cannon closer to the stockade under siege. He waited. Finally the demon led it right past him. He leaped on the demon, pulling him down to the mud and smashing down once with his tomahawk.

He snagged the demon's cloak and hat, wiping blood off his chin.

Then he went to work on the cannon.

...

He led the wagon up to the lines, where riflemen picked off any defenders in the stockade they could get a bead on from newly dug trenches. Abandoning it, he worked his way to a fresh team loading ball into their cannon. Spotting the powder mix for the charge on the ground beside the lead demon, he inched closer, reaching into his pocket to sprinkle additional saltpeter onto the mix. Next, he used a dab of tree resin to tack alcohol-soaked twine to the paper with the charge.

He darted over to the next cannon in line, unspooling twine behind him like a spider laying thread. At each cannon, he repeated the same procedure.

At the last cannon, he watched the demons until they began to prepare a load. While they were busy, he bent down and quickly attached the last of the twine, then pulled out some matches to light it--

There was a bellow, and the head cannoneer demon struck back Xander's shielding hat, revealing his humanity. The match fizzed out unborn in his fingers. The demon shouted a warning to the other cannoneer teams.

Before Xander could run, the demon backhanded him, and he crumpled to the ground.

...

Suddenly a figure with moonlit skin and red hair darted into the fray. Oz grabbed the long metal lighter used to ignite the charge and struck Xander's assailant with it before he put it to the paper and lit the charge Xander had fixed, sending a thread of flame toward the next cannon in line.

Xander gaped in shock at the smaller boy.

Oz grabbed Xander's cloak and shoved him into the closest trench. "You stupid--" Oz began.

The ground shook as fire and metal and screams flew through the air above them like fireworks in Hell.

"They're going to be pissed!" Oz yelled. Xander could feel the other boy shaking, and no wonder. He wasn't disguised: any demon could have seen him and enslaved him again. He'd taken a huge risk coming after Xander.

"Let's get out of here!" Xander yelled back over the noise. He was still dizzy from the blow the demon gave him, so it was Oz who guided him to safety, one pale arm still bearing the black bruises of his captivity steadying Xander.

...

"Look, lights over the Grass!" Buffy pointed.

"Bugger me, what is all that?" Spike stared at the shimmering beams of light over the horizon. The colors were brilliant and unearthly, like nothing he'd seen even in his long years.

"I don't know." She shrugged. "Sometimes we just see them. The Grass is on the edge of the world. Maybe that has something to do with it."

"Look a bit like the Northern Lights. The Aurora Borealis where I come from."

"I don't know what they are," Buffy said, her face soft as she watched the display. "They just make me feel better when I see them."

He reached out to take her hand. He saw her track the movement and let his fingers fall before making contact with hers. "I'm sorry for what happened to you. Sorry you had no pleasure in it."

"What I miss most is my cottage. I'd like to take a real bath," she said, avoiding the subject.

"You had a home other than this cave?"

She nodded. "I was driven from it one night."

Spike ground his teeth. "Right. Where's this cottage of yours?"

"On the edge of town...it's not much. I mainly miss my garden, not that I was very good with it, but...so much of what I do is about death. It was nice to plant something that wasn't. Forrest lives there now."

"We'll go there first thing in the morning so I want you to pack your things. You're not carrying a baby and living in a bloody cave!"

"But the townspeople--"

"Need a lesson," Spike snarled.

...

"Oz..." Xander wanted to give the other boy a grateful hug, but Oz was glaring at him. "Uh, are you hungry? I have the fixings for soup."

Oz paced by their tiny fire. "Soup? Yeah, I could eat. Terror makes a fella hungry."

"You shouldn't have come after me. What were you thinking? If they'd caught you--"

"Then I would have been a sex slave again, but I would have survived. I'm very good at...surviving," Oz finished bitterly. "I know how to be kept. How to please my owners."

Xander didn't know how to deal with Oz's raw pain so he made soup out of dried bits he collected as he walked the Grass. Roots, mushrooms, tree bark and dried meat. It didn't taste very good, but it was filling and he was used to it.

"We all do stuff we don't like to get by. Why'd you come after me?"

Oz collapsed next to Xander, watching Xander moodily as he stirred their meal. "Going into that camp and helping you was the most terrifying thing I've ever done...the only thing worse would have been to be alone. You take good care of me, Xander." And he stroked Xander's thigh once, holding his eyes.

Xander was hit by a sudden bloom of sexual need. It had been so long since he'd been touched. But he knew the truth now. "You're not gay, are you? You just told me that because..." He broke off and stopped stirring the soup. "Because you were scared and you heard the story of me and Jesse. So you figured you'd offer yourself to me and I'd take care of you."

Oz swallowed tightly. "Why else would you help me?" he asked simply.

The tiny hope that Xander had held that Oz was actually attracted to him died.

"Because it's the right thing to do, Oz. Because...you're my friend and I would never demand sexual favors to help you."

Oz pulled his hand away. "I don't understand. You can have me. What does it matter if I don't feel anything?"

"It matters to me! Jesse died because kissing me got him killed, but we couldn't stop ourselves. That kind of passion...I hope you find it one day, Oz."

Xander's throat was too tight with tears to eat. He left the soup to Oz and lay down to sleep, wrapped in his cloak.

Finally, Oz timidly curled up next to him, but unlike the other nights since his rescue, he didn't cuddle close to Xander for safety or warmth.

Staring dry eyed at the lights over the Grass, it was a long time before Xander slept.