She'd just finished brushing her teeth when the phone rang.

"Dawn?" came the voice on the line. She hadn't even said hello yet. "It's Willow. What's happened to Buffy?"

"Willow? Huh what?" Dawn cupped the phone in both hands, ducked into the kitchen. "I – what?"

"Something's wrong with Buffy," came Willow's voice over the line. There was a burst of static – apparently the connection between Italy and Brazil was a little shaky, but then Dawn was feeling a little shaky herself. "I was calling to ask if something had happened to her."

"What are you – I mean, yeah, I guess," Dawn began, "but – did you talk to Giles today or something?"

"No, no," Willow replied. "Sorry. I'm being all confusing girl, huh?"

"Well, kinda, yeah." Dawn flipped on the kitchen light, squinting against the glare. "I mean, if you didn't talk to Giles… wait, did you do something to her? Willow!"

"What? No, nothing like that, I swear! I just –" Willow took a deep breath. "Sorry. Wow, totally getting off on the wrong foot here. Sorry. Here, how about this – I'll tell you what I know, and I'll tell you how I know it so you don't wig out, and then you can tell me what's going on with you and Buffy, and we'll go from there, okay?"

"Okay, but this better be good," Dawn warned. She resisted the urge to pace up and down the hall again, reaching for the little bar stool they kept near the phone. "Buffy so does not need any crap like this right now."

"No, no crap, Dawnie, I promise," Willow said. "I mean, I know I've given you good reasons to worry in the past, but this time you don't have to. I was just doing an earth magic exercise. It's completely different from the bad magics, and it's something the coven in England taught me when I was recovering from the bad magics. Okay? It's completely safe."

Dawn couldn't help the sigh that escaped. "No offense, Willow?" she said, "But… I have heard that before."

"Rrgh, I know, okay? I know! Please, Dawn," said Willow, "I called because I'm worried about Buffy. You tell me – should I be, or not? Do I have time to explain in detail what I did and why it's safe? Is Buffy in danger, right now, right this second? 'Cause from what I felt, I kinda got the impression that she was."

"She…" Dawn bit her lip, sat down on the kitchen stool. "I think she's asleep right now. At least, she's in her room." She sighed again, heavier this time. "I'm sorry. It's just –" Dawn stopped, took a deep breath. "It's just that I'm halfway to Wigville, and yes, you should be worried, but I guess I'm taking things out on you, and you probably don't deserve that. Anyway. To answer your question, about Buffy… there was some stuff earlier today, but there isn't anything going on right now."

"Well, that's good to know, I guess," said Willow, her tone relaxing, "and thanks. For keeping an open mind." There was a pause, and Dawn could hear Willow shuffling around, wherever she was. "If Buffy's not in any immediate danger," she said after a moment, "if it helps, I could give you kind of a little lecture on, on magic theory for you to understand exactly what I was doing. Would that – do you think that might make you feel better? I mean I'm not trying to distract you, 'cause believe me I'd rather be focusing on helping Buffy right now, but I also want you to not wig out and I figure maybe a little background might help. Is that okay?"

Dawn chewed her lip for a second, shifted her weight on the stool, and plucked at the hem of her pajama shirt. "I guess so," she said finally, "but again – this better be good."

"Okay, great," said Willow. "Okay. Where do I start… okay. Um, the main difference between what you'd call good magic and bad magic, or black and white, o-or whatever, has to do with where witches draw their power from when they get ready to do a spell, okay? Before, when I was all with the bad magics – well, the way those work is basically, you grab a convenient power source, slap your will on top of it, and then turn it loose. The herbs and crystals and props and things help shape the power so that it will kind of "listen" better, or else help fit your willpower to the energy better, or maybe kinda both, if that makes sense? It's dangerous, for a bunch of different reasons."

"The addictive thing," said Dawn.

"That's one reason, yeah," said Willow, "but another is that… um… well, if there's one rule to magic – any kind of magic – it's that everything is connected, and because of those connections, every spell a witch casts has a price tag on it. It's like, if you pull on something over here, you better be prepared to push on something over there, or the power flows will be unbalanced and things will go boom. One way or another, there's always consequences."

"Spike said that once," said Dawn. She tried to ignore the little ache in her chest when she said his name.

"Yeah, he did," said Willow, "and hoo-boy, was he right. I didn't know any better at the time, so I used to treat magic like it was just another kind of computer programming; I figured I could just take blocks of code, or subroutines, whatever I needed and just plug them in to get the result I wanted, you know? And the thing is, as a quick-and-dirty approach, it does work – grabbing energy from elsewhere is actually pretty easy, even if you don't have any power of your own, which is why you and Giles and anybody else can do spells if you have the right ingredients and things. And if you do have power of your own, if you don't know any better it feels like a pretty simple shortcut. Oh, I'll just use the Pool of Karadon, oh, I'll just sacrifice that chicken, you know? And since your own power isn't the only thing in the equation, it's easy to convince yourself that there isn't really a price to pay, or that you can get away with paying it by using that other source of power instead of your own. Which you can't, by the way; in fact usually the price is higher because you also end up owing something to whatever entity you took power from in the first place. Plus, with everything being connected, the energy you grab to shape into a spell also shapes you, and shapes your power, whether you notice it or not. Um, hence addiction, hence dark and scary things happening… hence why I don't do that anymore."

"But you still know something about Buffy and you used magic to find out," said Dawn.

"Right," said Willow, "but like I said, that was earth magic, totally not the same thing – which is why I'm trying to explain the difference, remember?"

"I know," said Dawn. "And I appreciate you taking the time. I am listening, I swear." Her lip was starting to hurt from all the chewing on it, but at the same time, all this magic talk was actually pretty interesting. If nothing else, it helped to take her mind off her worry for Buffy, if only for a few minutes.

"Okay, so, earth magic doesn't work the same as the bad magics, well, not mostly, anyway," said Willow. "The rule still applies – everything is connected – but earth magic is all about connecting, see, because we're all connected to the earth just by virtue of being here. Remember before, how I said if you pull on something here you need to balance it by pushing on something else over there?"

"Yeah," said Dawn.

"I used to treat magic like programming, and the bad stuff does kinda operate that way. But earth magic is more like, like managing an ecosystem. Or like playing music on the strands of a spider's web, while you're sitting in it. Everything is connected, in ways you can't even imagine. It's so beautiful, once you really see it, so intricate, so… heh. Sorry," said Willow. "It's pretty amazing stuff."

"I gather," said Dawn. "But back to the topic?"

"Right," Willow replied. "So. Everything is intertwined with everything else, and all of it is connected to the earth. To use earth magic, you strengthen that connection, reach through it to the person or thing you want to affect, and then you use your mutual connection along with your willpower to make the changes you're looking for. The price tag is right there in front of you, because again, the energy shapes you as much as the thing you're, um, targeting. Plus there are things earth magic won't let you do, or at least, not without a lot more effort involved, and that's its own kind of price tag. But since you're not taking any shortcuts that way, the things you can do end up being more powerful than they would if you just, y'know, stole power from a demon or made a sacrifice or something."

"Okay," said Dawn, "but you still haven't told me what this has to do with Buffy."

"I'm getting to that, I promise," said Willow. "In fact I'm getting to it right now. So. When I was with the coven over in England, part of my – rehab, I guess you could call it – part of my rehab was, they gave me these exercises to do, so I could learn the whole connecting-to-the-earth thing. Once they were sure I could do that, they gave me exercises where I reached through the earth a-and practiced making a connection to something familiar. They're not spells, not really – they're more like preparation or, or laying the groundwork, or something along those lines. Like, they might be 'step one' of a spell if I was going to do one, but by themselves they don't do anything. Anyway," Dawn heard her sigh quietly, "since I was pretty homesick, and grieving for Tara and everything, a lot of times I practiced by connecting to you guys back home. Like touching your part of the spider web, or… Ooh! I know! What I was doing was like, like reaching out and just touching your shoulder with a fingertip. Barely any contact at all, just enough to establish the connection. Am I making sense so far?"

"So far, yeah," said Dawn. "You're saying you didn't do anything to Buffy – and I believe you, so, you know, thanks again for the explanation – but you contacted her and then something happened?"

"Well, not happened-happened, but I definitely noticed something," said Willow. "See, the exercise barely makes any contact, but even that teeny tiny connection can give me some very primitive feedback about what kind of state your energy is in. We're talking, really basic data, like if you're alive – 'cause otherwise I wouldn't be able to find you to connect to… at least I don't think so, although I guess maybe… or, or it could tell me if you're okay or maybe what you were feeling if it were really strong, or whatever. I wouldn't be able to get anything beyond that without casting an actual spell, but the really super-basic stuff like that does come through."

"And Buffy had a really, um, emotional day today," said Dawn. "Maybe you felt that?"

Willow made a worried little sound, almost hidden behind the static on the line. "Ohh… I hope that's all it was, Dawnie, but I got a bad feeling," she said. "See, things have been really hectic lately, you know, what with the apocalypse and all, and I realized that I'd gotten out of the habit of doing my exercises. So I sat down to do them today, just a little bit ago. Connected with the earth, which feels really different in Brazil by the way, and reached out, just like I usually do, right? And everyone else felt pretty much the same as always, but when I got to Buffy… she felt… wrong. Really messed up. Not just tired or upset, which we all kinda are, or even mourning like Xander is over – you know – over losing Anya. Buffy was, she…" Dawn heard Willow take a deep breath. "B-Buffy felt…"

There was a long pause in which Dawn could only hear the static hissing over the line. "What?" she pressed. "Willow? Buffy felt what?"

"Shredded," said Willow, her tight with worry. "Like something had attacked her and just… just mauled her, on a spiritual level. She felt –" Willow's voice was wobbling and Dawn thought she heard a sniffle, "Dawnie, she felt like she had pieces missing. Of… of her soul."