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Author's Chapter Notes:
Beta'd by the incrediable Spikeslovebite.
Chapter 27

**
.
Previously:

“So…kittens?”

Bugger.

**

Quickly evaluating his options, Spike decided to go with the truth and hope that she decided to re-educate rather than dust him on principle. “Some demons use ‘em as currency, luv. I can trade ‘em for cash to buy blood and supplies.”

“And the people you trade them to...what do they do with them,” Buffy asked, confused.

“I trade them to Clem for cash, 'cause Clem’s a bloody tragic poker player, luv.” Spike wondered just how long he could distract her from the actual question she had asked by confusing her with misdirection.

“Poker?” Buffy had the sinking feeling that this conversation was not going to end well.

“Kitten Poker,” Spike corrected her before he had time to think, then silently berated himself for being an idiot that needed to learn to keep his big mouth shut.

Buffy stopped abruptly and turned her shocked gaze on the vampire that was anticipating a great deal of bodily harm in the not too distant future. “Kittens. You use kittens as currency in your poker games?”

“Well, it used to be nubile young virgins, but those are in short supply these days. Scarce as hens teeth they are.” Spike hoped that a little humour would distract her, but he doubted the likelihood of that given her focused expression.

“What happens to the kittens?” Buffy asked firmly. She had finally worked out his game. Direct questioning was only way she was getting the answers she wanted.

“I told ya’, luv. I trade ‘em to Clem,” Spike patiently explained, stubbornly clinging to the hope that he would think of something that would get him out of the great bollixing mess he could feel himself sinking deeper and deeper into.

“What does um, Clem do with them, Spike?” Buffy asked calmly.

Spike gulped. The moment was here. It could no longer be put off. “Clem gets a snack.”

“EWWWW Spike!” Buffy screeched as she smacked him painfully on the arm. “No more kitten poker...ever!”

~*~*~

“I could have died,” Joyce whispered the words, her gaze haunted. He mind reeled with the aftershock of the day’s events. This morning she’d been slightly irritable because of the pain of the continuing headaches and the doctor’s failure to discover what was causing them. Then this strange woman had arrived and changed Joyce’s world. Forever.

Joyce thought about the bizarre journey she’d taken with her eldest daughter and a protective vampire to an empty swimming pool. She had watched when, upon arriving, said vampire had dived into the pool head first, only to disappear before he hit the bottom. In the blink of an eye she had been transported to a dungeon-like room, where she’d learned that she would be held as collateral while Spike fought for her very life. She’d seen the big-hearted vampire make those horrific trials look easy. She’d watched helplessly as he willingly, without a moment of hesitation, agreed to give up his existence so that she could have hers. She had felt the illness leave her when the small man that had been their contact for the trials had touched her head.

She had been jubilant on the journey back to her home. Her euphoria had not abated when she shared her adventure with her younger child. She had been more than happy to take Dawn to the Magic Box so that the young girl could show her gratitude to the vampire that had saved her mother’s life.

Joyce had been a little surprised at her own reaction to the intrusion of the brunette vampire. Her feelings of animosity towards him had clearly not changed in the almost two years that he had been gone. She still hated him. She had been outraged by his attempts to dominate the blond vampire that had captured a piece of her heart. She had shown absolute support when her protector had chosen to free himself from the control of the detested elder vampire. She had felt her carefully hidden fear and concern for the younger vampire well up and almost choke her with it’s intensity as the battle for freedom had progressed. She felt her trepidations wash away with the depth of her relief when the clash was over and the victor unharmed.

She had happily sighed in contentment as she watched her baby girl sleep.

Then, as she sat to take a relaxing moment for herself, she realised something. She could have died.

“But you didn’t.”

Penny’s calm assurance pierced the fog of panic that was threatening to once again overwhelm her. Joyce felt torn between her joy at being alive and her fear for her daughters’ well being if anything had happened to her. At the moment the fear was winning.

Joyce’s anxiety made her voice harsh. “And Buffy and Dawn? What would have happened to them if I had? How would they have survived?” Turning fear filled eyes that glistened with moisture towards the calm psychologist, Joyce whispered her last question. “What would have become of my babies?”

“Life would have happened to them Joyce.” Penny smiled gently at the distressed woman. “It would have been hard. It always is when you lose a loving mother. But they didn’t lose you, and from what you said, they won’t for a long time. They have the time to finish growing up now and you… well, you get to watch them and help them and live a little of that life for yourself.” Taking Joyce’s hands in hers, Penny gave them a soft squeeze as she smiled playfully and gently chided the other woman. “I always thought you were a ‘glass is half full’ kinda girl, Joyce. You’re focusing on the wrong end of this deal. The fact that you almost died means one thing and one thing only…you’re alive.”

“I’m alive.”

~*~*~

Spike glanced furtively at the still fuming blond at his side. The dull ache in his right hand had upgraded itself to mildly excruciating. He was forced to hold his arm stiffly by his side so that the intense pain of accidentally moving the bugger didn’t cause him to black out. It looked like the witches’ poultice had worn off and if he wasn’t mistaken, he’d broken at least a few more bones in the fight with the poof. He supposed he really shouldn’t be miffed that the little bugger at the trials hadn’t healed it when he healed the holy water burns on his left hand, but would it really have made that much of a bloody difference? To top it all off, he had a brassed off slayer on his hands and not the first bleedin’ clue of how to get little Miss Mood-Swing to flip the switch back to happy land. She was the most frustrating, cantankerous…

“Spike, what’s wrong?” Buffy’s worried voice unknowingly interrupted Spikes internal rant.

“What?” he asked in confusion. He stopped walking and turned to look at her.

“You’re walking funny and doing that grinding of your teeth thingy. So, what’s wrong?” she critically looked him over as she asked her question. Taking in the way his arm was stiffly held at his side brought her gaze down to his damaged hand. Her eyes widened as her memories brought a very clear image of her unknowingly damaging his hand the day before only to have the scene warp into a picture of him fighting Angel. “Your hand,” she whispered in concern. Her solicitude rapidly changed to ire at the realisation that he’d risked himself to fight with a broken hand. “ARE YOU CRAZY?!”

“ARRRGGGGHHH!” Spike threw his head back and yelled in frustration. “That’s IT!” Grabbing her right hand with his left, the furious master vampire decisively changed the direction they had been headed in and dragged the surprised girl after him as he purposely strode into the night.

“Move your bloody arse, Slayer.”





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