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Previously on Dancing the Night Away
The battle is over and Illyria has taken Spike to Rome to search for Angel. There they meet Buffy who seems to be searching for The Immortal. All three are transported, first to the mountains, then somewhere entirely unexpected.
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Chapter 4: Dance of Death.
They followed Liam past bushes hung with candles lighting the way back to the dolmen. Beside the driftwood bonfire, local musicians gathered around one of the fallen stones, talking quietly to a group of Zampognari, one of whom hid his face beneath a wolf's mask. He sat on a makeshift throne, his head crowned with holly, his right hand resting on a scabbard, his left holding a branch of mistletoe.
A woman dressed in green, with a garland of oak across her breast, stepped forward from the group. “Oak King, Lord of the Greenwood, come to this circle to meet your challenge. You who shine your light throughout our lands and bring life to the Lady's forests and fields! Come, my husband of Summer, be with us now.”
The crowd hustled a protesting Liam towards the throne, thrusting a sword into his hand, and placing a crown of oak leaves on his head. Liam grinned at his audience. “I raise my sword in challenge, Lord of the Holly,” he hiccuped. “I claim the right to ascend the throne. Will you meet me in battle?"
“I raise my sword in answer to your challenge, Lord of the Oak. I fight to keep the throne!” The Holly King removed his mask and strode into the centre of seven Zampognari forming a circle behind the dolmen.
"Ambrogio," Buffy gasped.
“Now there’s a surprise,” Spike sneered.
Liam staggered into the ring and waited for the Immortal to begin the ritual.
“Angel hates dancing,” Buffy hissed. "Plus. He's drunk."
“That’s not Angel. Not yet,” Spike replied.
"And never shall be, if all unfolds as the painting foretold." Illyria moved back into the shadow of the stone portal and watched the approaching darkness consume the flickering candlelight along the sea road.
Without warning, six of the dancers began to move, slowly at first, their staffs echoing across the silence as they clashed and crossed one another. The seventh man leaped and spun, ducking and weaving through the dance without missing a beat.
The remaining Zampognari barred the villagers from entering the circle, pushing them back towards the standing stones. The two ‘kings’ raised their swords, while the dancers twirled and stamped around them, marking time with feet and sticks.
"Where's the music?" Buffy asked, glancing at the musicians whose instruments lay untouched on the ground.
"This is the Dark Dance." Illyria's disembodied voice floated through the gloom. "The dance of the Winter King."
Spike stepped under the capstone and faced her. "Look. I don't know how you got your powers back, but even you can't want Angel dead… deader..." He shook his head in frustration. "Think about it. If Liam died before Darla got to him, there'd be no Drusilla and I'd be mouldering in a grave somewhere, prob'ly Highgate or somewhere just as naff. Buffy would've copped it fighting her first or second vampire. And you. You'd still be stuck in the Deeper Well."
"This I already know." Illyria's gaze never wavered. "What is it you would have me do?"
"What you do best." Spike glanced at the dancers. "Survive.”
"The Earth is wrapped in stillness and we move in a trance, but we hold on fast to our faith in the dance." A figure moved towards the bonfire, a flaming torch held high. "Who will light the sacred fire, bringing back our hearts' desire? Sacred fire, kindled bright, lead us back into the light."
"I am the cold that chills the bone and wraps the seed tight in the dark earth." Ambrogio thrust the tip of his sword towards Liam's throat.
"I am the warmth on your face and the grain in the fields." Liam parried.
"Let the flame of Yule flare forth this night through the darkness. Deep to all wayfarers and folk of Earth." The torchbearer touched the flame to the kindling. "As a beacon its brightness burns. As a blessing it blazes forth. I light this flame to welcome Yule."
Illyria tilted her head, watching in fascination as the fire caught, flared for a second, then guttered and subsided as the darkness smothered it.
Liam brought the hilt of his sword high over Ambrogio's head, feinting a killing blow. "I have slain my brother..."
Ambrogio cut the short the words that would end the ritual, swinging his blade upwards, slicing through Liam's waistcoat and shirt, plunging the tip of the sword into his throat. Liam dropped his weapon and fell to his knees, blood spurting from the wound in his kneck.
“Illyria! Now!” yelled Spike, sprinting to Liam's side.
It was too late. Liam lay on the frozen earth, unmoving.”
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Words used in the ritual adapted from from the Wiccan Pagan Times and poetry found on Aine Minogue