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Chapter 18

Buffy shared her younger self’s reaction. Her mind was reeling. Angel, her soul mate, her one true love, was changing literally before her eyes into someone she didn’t know and it terrified her. He had been her role model, her balance, her safe haven. He had been the individual she had judged all others by. She didn’t recognise the Angel she was seeing, she could feel the duplicity of her emotions; she still loved him, but now she didn’t know why.

Buffy could feel her younger self’s growing discontent with the brunette vampire. The Younger Buffy was getting seriously weirded out by what she perceived as Angel’s creepy behaviour and more and more obsessed with the ‘man’ from her dreams, while the older Buffy was forced to go through every emotion with her. She felt like she was being torn in two. She didn’t know how to reconcile what she thought she knew with what she was seeing. She had heard her mother’s words, but she didn’t want them to be true. She didn’t want to be forced to acknowledge that she had been so wrong about Angel. The very thought that the Angel that lived in her memories was disappearing didn’t even occur to her.

Lost in her musings, Buffy was startled when Giles gently cleared his throat.

“Huh?”

“You ewwwed?” Dawn glibly reminded her sister.

“Oh…um…Angel’s in the library…there was singing…” Buffy screwed up her face in distaste.

“'nough said,” Spike snorted derisively. Looking around at the blank faces that regarded him, he expanded on his comment, “Makes Peewee Herman sound like Pavarotti…or for the younger generation, makes nails on a blackboard sound like one of those boy bands you like so much, niblet.”

Giles looked at Buffy with a mixture of suspicion and curiosity; suspicion that she wasn’t sharing the whole story and curiosity as to what Angel was doing in the library in the first place. He chose to voice his curiosity; “Why on earth is Angel at the library?”

“Not a clue, but the gang is there because they wanted to try and see what you and mom were up to.” Buffy grinned at the obvious discomfort of her mother and the watcher. At the same time she fervently hoped that she had successfully diverted the conversation.

“I’ll tell her that Dawn and I are spending time with Rupert so we can better understand what’s going on, but, that being said, I think we’ll need to organise a meeting with the others fairly soon.” Now that the decision to inform the younger Buffy had been made, Joyce was not prepared to mislead her daughter any more than necessary.

“I agree. However, I feel that it is important to hear what Brother Luther has to say first. Would Monday evening be acceptable?” Giles asked.

“We should have the meeting at my house, but I don’t want that Angel to be there.” Joyce’s dislike of the brooding vampire was quite evident.

Buffy made a split second decision; the threat of Angelus not withstanding, while she was feeling so ambivalent towards him, it might be easier if his invitation was revoked. Turning to Jenny, Buffy took a deep breath, before asking the question that she never would have believed she would ask. Not again anyway.

“Can you do a disinvite spell?”

Jenny carefully considered her words before speaking. “Actually, I have a special disinvite spell that you might be more interested in. I was going to offer it to Rupert.”

“Special, you say?” Giles queried, intrigued.

“Yes, it’s a mixture between a protection spell and a disinvite spell. Even if you invite a vampire into your home, they can’t get past the barrier and thrall doesn’t work on the person protected by the barrier, so they can’t be tricked to come out,” Jenny explained. She had worked for a long time to perfect the spell; she knew exactly how beneficial it would be to them all.

While Giles was delighting in the benefits of such a spell, Dawn was far from pleased, “No way! That would keep Spike out too.”

“Not if he’s in the house when I do the spell.” Jenny smiled at the teen, happy to alleviate her fears.

“Oh…cool.” Dawn tried to act nonchalant while she bubbled inside with glee. She couldn’t wait to see Angel’s face when he discovered that one.

“Yes, that does sound like the best idea,” Joyce beamed. Turning to Spike and placing a gentle hand on his cheek, she continued to speak “We can’t very well have family unable to get in, can we?” She watched as Spike’s eyes filled with awe at her words. “But if you ever try to emotionally blackmail me again, you will be grounded until Dawn graduates.” Spike smiled sheepishly as Joyce smirked.

Giles watched the playful family interaction and smiled indulgently. He was not surprised at his protective leanings towards the older slayer, but he was surprised that those feelings now seemed to include the mother, the sister, and the blond vampire. He realised in that moment that the differences in the two vampires was clearly defined in the way they perceived love, and he was unable to stop himself from speaking his thoughts.

“I admire you Spike; there are not many that are capable of loving so openly and purely.”

While Spike was shyly thanking the watcher, pleasantly surprised by the unexpected compliment, Buffy was stunned. “Um…Giles?” Buffy waited until she had his attention, “Okay, I get that Spike could be different, but shouldn’t you be like, more surprised or wigged or something? I mean, you know, there’s that whole ‘soulless demons can’t love’ theory?”

“Well, certainly the books all suggest that, but there has never been any proof offered with that supposition, and clearly anyone who actually took the time to talk to Spike would have to discount the theory as ludicrous,” Giles answered Buffy’s question, curious as to why the subject was even being discussed.

“It’s what you told me, told all of us Giles. When Angel lost his soul, he didn’t love me anymore. After everything was over, I asked him why and he told me that demons couldn’t love without a soul. You agreed with him. I didn’t believe Spike when he told me he loved me because of what I’d been taught. He told me a year ago, Giles, and I’ve only recently started believing that Spike’s feelings are real.” Buffy was near tears. She couldn’t believe what she was hearing. This couldn’t be happening. How many other ‘facts’ were wrong? ‘How much time have you wasted,’ the traitorous voice in her head whispered.

“I don’t know why I would have supported a theory that I’ve never thought much of. I can’t give you those answers, dear. Clearly something changed my opinion, but without living through those experiences, I couldn’t possibly reach a conclusion. I’m so sorry, Buffy.” Giles silently berated the prat he’d become. He had obviously done very badly by his slayer, but he had no intention of doing so again.

“It’s not the soul. It’s the level of humanity that determines the depth of your love,” Jenny quietly offered the clearly traumatised girl. “Without his soul, Angel has no humanity in him. His demon has destroyed it all. The soul brings with it a semblance of humanity, sort of like a residual echo, but that’s lost when the soul is.”

Buffy stared at the gypsy, wordlessly begging her to continue, to bring some light to the darkness that she felt surrounding her.

“If, because of everything you’ve believed for so long, you need some proof regarding Spike’s ability to love, there’s always the spell of Clear Sight,” Jenny offered hesitantly. Her own curiosity had her hoping that she would be permitted to do the spell. She didn’t doubt the vampire at all, but the spell would also allow her to gauge Rupert’s ability and that she was very interested in.

When Buffy hesitated with indecision, Spike took the opportunity to speak his mind. “I don’t trust magic. There are always consequences. That bein’ said, tell me about the spell.”

“It’s a simple incantation and it doesn’t actually ask for any gain or damage to the natural balance, so it’s not considered a spell of consequence. It has a specific time frame so it’s contained. It simply asks that the light of humanity become visible for a certain period of time. The consequence is that it cannot be person specific, all of us will see and all of us will be seen,” Jenny calmly informed the vampire.

Spike carefully considered the expressions on every face before turning once again to the gypsy. “Do it.”

Jenny nodded to him, closed her eyes and found her centre.

“From strike of twelve count twenty-four, that's how long the spell is for, humanity’s light I cannot see, so make it shine, so mote it be.”





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