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Willow and Giles were still in research mode so Rachael started laying the table, and collecting everything needed to feed the group. She knew that if no-one hassled them, they could forget to eat for days.

When, eventually, everyone had gathered for dinner, Giles still had his head in the book that Br. Roberto had given him. The watchers’ diaries had shown him a different side of the Slayer and her life. A woman protected by the love that surrounded her. Those diaries had gone back millennia, stopping in the fourteen hundreds; but the book had spells in it that had created the slayer, spells that showed the original slayer as a willing volunteer, who had taken on the strengths of a demon with the balance of an angel’s soul, to protect her people from the evil in the night. The original council had only done a part of the spell, even though they believed they had done the whole. The other part had come from the Guardians. A secretive group, culminating in the woman who had tried to help Buffy with the First. If the book was right it confirmed everything they had been told by Rosamund and Matilda. That Slayers were meant to have a mate to stand by their side, a mate as strong as they were. That they were meant to have a group of friends to back them up. They were not meant to be alone, and nor were they meant to die so very young, but live forever. Now to find a reputable source to confirm both book and story.

‘We need someone or something that we can rely on to confirm everything we’ve been told so far,’ stated Giles.

‘How about Mom?’ answered Buffy, handing over the precious letter to Giles. ‘It’s her writing, and Spike says it smells of her.’

Giles took the precious missive and read it carefully. ‘Well, it looks like we’re trusting Br. Roberto for now. So he has confirmed everything we were told? And what do we do next?’

‘Next for me,’ said Buffy, ‘is to trace Quentin Travers. Willow and Xander can go with you tomorrow; I’m going to train slayers tonight. I feel the need to hit something but before I go, we promised no secrets between any of us. So with Dawn’s permission I’m telling you all this. You know that Dawn was made from my DNA, she carries my blood? Well, seems that The Powers That Be chose Spike to be the daddy.’ She gave her lover a wonderful smile. After the initial explosion of sound from the gathered Scoobies, Xander slapped Spike on the back and offered him a congratulations and an invisible cigar.

For the rest of the meal the conversation concentrated on more mundane topics.
Spike still carried a soppy grin on his face every time he looked at Dawn.

It was a very subdued group that returned from the library the following evening. Xander and Willow had been given ‘the Talk’ from Br. Roberto, made to face the truths about the way they had behaved towards Buffy in the past. Their own petty jealousies and insecurities looked even worse when the old monk had pulled them into daylight and made the two friends have a good look at their actions. He had a way of really making one see what the true reason behind an action was, and neither of them had been able to lie any more. Willow had seen that she had been jealous of Buffy’s strength and power, not trusting Buffy with her own life. And Willow had also been made to realise that she couldn’t manipulate everyone around her.

Xander couldn’t even look Buffy in the face. Having been made to look at the callow youth he had been, he had been made to see his attempted Rape of Buffy when possessed by the hyena for what it really was, the expression of his lust, and his interference with her love life as nothing more than a petty jealousy, even his final betrayal of her just before the battle with the First was examined, and his anger at Buffy not saving his eye was analysed. He had also been forced to see his behaviour with Anya for what it was, manipulative and cruel. He just hoped that wherever Anya was she forgave him. He really did feel sorry for what had happened.

Giles knew how they felt. He had already been through it with Br. Roberto. The monk could have made a fortune as a counsellor. Nothing was hidden from him, no secret too dark or obscure for him to find. But they, like he, would survive and be better for the so-called interference from the monk, and so would the others.

Giles started to look through the titles of books that they had brought home with them, some written in English but the majority in ancient languages, long forgotten by most scholars. There were grimoires, encyclopedias on demons, vampire law and vampire lore and right at the bottom, as though it had been the first book placed in the pile, was an atlas of the dimensions; from the lowest Hell dimension, through the neutral ones like the one they were in to the heavenly dimensions that hopefully Jenny inhabited.

‘Of course that’s where I normally am, Rupert,’ a familiar voice said behind him. Giles turned to see a vibrant Jenny standing there, a huge smile on her face. Giles couldn’t believe his eyes. He looked towards the apparition in front of him, then at the others gathered in the sitting room.

‘They won’t see me until I want them to,’ Jenny explained. ‘I wanted to talk to you first. You said you needed proof that what you had been told here and with the vampires was true; well it is, but more than my words, listen to your own heart. You know that the old council didn’t always do the best for the slayers, you know that there were secrets and plots. They even had teams dedicated to wiping out uncooperative slayers. Hardly the behaviour of guardians. Well was it?’

‘Jenny,’ Giles managed in a voice racked with emotion. ‘Are you really here?’

‘Yes Rupert, I’m really here. Think of this as a really good telephone link.’ She answered with a smile.

‘God it’s good to see you; fantastic!’ Giles was losing his normal reserve. ‘Do you need something from me, us, if so what do you need?’ Giles was getting over awed again. The last few days were getting a bit much, even for someone trained in witchcraft and magic.

‘I need to speak to you. I think as soon as we are all together business will go out the window. Anyway, what we want from you is for you set up the Council as it should have been, protecting, nurturing the slayers, allowing them a life of their own when the time comes, giving them all they need. The training for watchers will be hard, harder than it has ever been, and the slayers you get will be more like Buffy than Kendra, they won’t do as they are told but will allow their own natures to dictate behaviour. Oh, but the rewards you have in front of you! You are just 15 generations from closing every hell mouth in this plane, of banishing the first evil from Earth for ever, being left with Vampires like Spike and demons like Clem, a world free from outside dark influences, free to choose its own path. Are you ready for the challenge? I’ve had to pay for what my people did, for lying to you. And I need you to forgive Angelus, not just Angel, but the demon as well. Don’t let the hate and anger blind you to another vampire’s good points. It can eat you up: he won’t suffer, just you, and I don’t want that for you, Rupert Giles.’

Giles just nodded and walked towards Jenny, into her outstretched arms and felt at peace, in the arms of the woman he really could have loved if he’d allowed himself. Ripper growled gently into her neck.

Jenny started to fade, turning into a phantom in his arms. ‘You never know, I might be able to find a pair of handcuffs again, Ripper,’ she said as she left him. Giles went bright red.

‘Are you OK, G-Man?’ asked Xander.
‘Would you please refrain from calling me by that ridiculous name?’ Giles said exasperatedly, secretly pleased that Xander had given him something to help get the balance in his mind restored.

‘Back to the books; what have you found out?’

‘So far it seems everything we were told is true, even has mention of a marriage ceremony here for Vampire and Slayer.’ Xander said, holding up one of the books. ‘So, looks like we can get Buffy to make an honest man of the undead one; and this one was written in 1327, way before Travers started twisting things,’ he added, holding up a second book. ‘It seems to be sort of a slayer handbook, describes the privileges a slayer can expect when she retires. A house, servants, money, all sorts.’
‘Retires? I never thought about Buffy retiring, ever,’ Giles spoke up. ‘That book will be really useful. Give us a lot of information on the way things were done BT.’

‘BT?’

‘Before Travers.’

Willow had gone very quiet; Rachael put a hand on her shoulder. ‘What is it love?’
‘All this, Buffy and the slayers have had it far harder than they should. Kendra died before she ever had a life, Faith only just survived and poor Buffy had to fight everything including keeping a roof over her head, over all of our heads when her Mom died. We were supposed to help her and she was on her own.’

‘It’s OK; we can fix this, make the future better for everyone. I think you’re still upset by Br. Roberto; I could have hit him.’

‘No, he was right, we needed to know what he said. I did manipulate people when they didn’t do what I wanted; when they upset me I tried to alter their thoughts. I was wrong and I don’t think I realised how wrong until he talked to me.’ Willow held onto her lover tightly. Thinking about all she had done in the past. She really needed to ask Buffy’s forgiveness, they all did.

‘What you got there, Giles?’ she asked, wiping the tears away from her face.

‘A map, an atlas really, of all the dimensions. It shows both heaven and hell and the neutral planes; seems there’s not just our world but hundreds like it. It has even got the spells we need to travel anywhere. It seems you need a key to do the actual opening up of the doorways, and for that we have Dawn.’

‘So now we know why they chose us to help. With this information and Dawn’s help there is nowhere for Travers to hide from us; we can go in and get him anytime we’re ready.’ Willow said.

‘I think he would have enough bad dreams about the last time he crossed Buffy. I remember her throwing that sword, do you think it would be polite to warn him?’ Xander asked with a grin.

‘Nah, lets surprise him like he used to do with us,’ he said, answering his own question.

Rachael smiled at the group around her, she felt so much at home with them all. So glad she had volunteered to be with them and to help them through the transition.





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