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[A/N: The great thing about writing is that, if you are good at it, sometimes the story just takes over and writes itself. Seems to be what’s happening here. Oh well, if you don’t like it, blame my muses, James Marsters and the fairytale Beauty and the Beast (oh c’mon, don’t tell me you don’t recognize the correlations). Title is from Peter Gabriel’s song of the same name and the quotes as attributed. Ah, if you ever get to Wales, run, don’t walk to Tintern Abbey. Disclaimers unfortunately still in full force and effect.]

Previously: Spike got used as a chew toy by the new bad and he accidently bit Buffy. This picks up shortly afterwards.

26. Red rain is falling down all over me.

Sensations sweet,
felt in the blood, and felt along the heart.
William Wordsworth, lines completed a few miles above Tintern Abbey

Your hand found mine.
Life rushed to my fingers like a blood clot.
Oh, my carpenter,
the fingers are rebuilt.
Anne Sexton, The Touch


By the time Xander, Anya and Dawn returned to the Magic Shop, four bags of O negative and additional supplies in hand, Spike was laid out on the couch in the training room, Buffy was sitting on the floor next to him, with Giles and Tara cleaning up the mess in the main area. The trail of blood that had dried up was easy to flake off the floor, but the wet stuff pooled under the chair was a bit harder to clean up. Spike was out cold, Buffy not much better and strangely enough, Giles wasn’t in the least bit upset with what had happened. Wasn’t like he planned it, wasn’t like he’d been trying to bite her, it was a reflex action, done in the throes of pain, and given the amount of pain he already was in, Giles wasn’t surprised when the chip’s reaction was masked. It had been, however, despite Tara’s best efforts to put the vampire to sleep, the last straw that knocked him out.

They’d moved him, checking his injuries after he ingested slayer’s blood. The leg wounds and the minor bites on his legs were closed up, disappearing as they watched, and the gaping wounds on his hand had stopped bleeding finally. He’d not taken a lot of blood from Buffy, as near as Giles could tell, but she was still reeling from the after-effects. On wobbly knees, she’d followed him into the training room, slumping down next to the couch.

Giles and Tara worked in silence, both of them wrapped up in their own thoughts. Tara’d never seen Spike awake and in so much pain, she’d not seen him after Glory’s beating until almost a week later and he’d already been on the road to recovery. This was the first time she’d ever seen him badly injured. His hand looked like it had been fed through a meat grinder improperly, and only then because the fingers were still discernable. She’d nearly thrown up just looking at it.

But she’d helped him, as best she could, with her poor magics, hoping that the healing spell she’d woven around him would work, aided by Buffy’s blood.

******************************* ***************************************

She should be really upset with him, with herself. And yet, she almost couldn’t bring herself to care. Oh, not true, not really. He’d needed the healing – needed it like the rest of them needed air – and instinctively, he’d moved to take it, without thinking. But she’d heard him whimper in pain when he’d sunk his teeth into her skin, felt his tears on her shoulder and something inside her couldn’t blame him. So it wasn’t life threatening. But what good was a vampire warrior with one hand? What good would it be to further hamper an already handicapped warrior? None at all.

A damaged Spike was a Spike that couldn’t help her, couldn’t fight. And she knew, as well as she knew herself that him losing the use of one of his hands would be damaging to his spirit beyond repair. He needed the fight, needed something to feel useful.

So she’d just held on tighter. Held him close to her chest, let his tears drip down her shoulder, mixing with the blood he couldn’t swallow. And never realized her own tears had slid down her face.

Despite her best efforts not to, she compared his bite to that of the other vampires who’d come close enough to her to get a taste. Only one of them had she offered herself to willingly, until now. While it had started out as an accident, Buffy wasn’t sorry he’d done it. Angel, in the midst of his own life-threatening crisis had bitten hard, nearly draining her, and causing no little amount of pain. The others didn’t really count, the Master and Dracula, because they’d gotten no more than just a little taste. But Spike, injured and out of it, hadn’t drained her at all, instead had cried when he realized what he’d done. That he’d slipped into unconsciousness almost immediately after clamping down was immaterial. She’d felt his tears, felt his remorse.

Huh.

Spike hadn’t wanted to bite her.

A vampire that didn’t want slayer’s blood. The Slayer of Slayers, William the Bloody, didn’t want her blood. Part of her was just a little miffed, but far more of her understood why he’d reacted the way he did. They’d come to far in the past couple of years to make this really simple. Despite all his attempts to kill her, despite their many close calls, this was the first time Spike had gotten a taste of her.

But the weirdest thing of all wasn’t that she understood his involuntary reaction to the pain, but that she was upset when he’d cried.

So was she angry? The answer was no.

Was she upset that he’d bitten her? Again no.

Was this as bad as what had happened to Angel?

Nearly so. In this time, in this place. Yeah it was just about the same. So, was she going to threaten him with further pain just to satisfy a non-existent need for revenge?

Not anytime soon.

Did she trust him? Yeah.

Did she trust him enough? Oh yeah.

He’d bitten her, on her shoulder, not her neck, which was just as close, and had more blood available. Hell, her jugular veins and carotid arteries were there, all within striking reach, and as a vampire he knew that better than anyone else. And what had he gone for? Her shoulder.

So yeah, she trusted him. Trusted him enough to offer more. Because if he wanted to use that hand any time in the next couple of weeks, she was going to have to donate. And she didn’t feel like bleeding drip by drip into a cup for him either.

She leaned against his chest, watching him. The clean white of the bandages was a stark contrast to his black tee shirt. They’d elevated his badly damaged right hand, propping it against the back of the couch. His left hand was across his chest, and as she watched him, it twitched a couple of times, then was still.

“Spike” she whispered, “can you hear me?” His hand twitched again, almost in agitation and she tried again to reach him. “Its okay. Well, I mean its not really okay, but its not bad. I understand why you did it and I’m not gonna dust you, not even gonna get mad. I could, but, no point. So you can wake up now and I’m babbling” Buffy huffed, exasperated with herself. “Really. I’m not gonna stake you. Giles isn’t either. So its all good. C’mon Spike wake up and talk to me.”

“Would, but you’re natterin’ on well enough for both of us” he spoke without opening his eyes, afraid to look at her and see disgust and anger in her hazel green depths.

“Hah” oh that’s just brilliant babble-girl . . . Can’t you come up with something a little more intelligent? Buffy grew serious seeing that he wouldn’t face her. “Hey, its really okay. You were in pain and just couldn’t control it so much” she paused, running a hand over his forearm. “How’s your head now?”

“Throbbing in thirds to the hand” was his sardonic reply.

They were silent for a moment, each wrapped up in their own thoughts. When he spoke, Buffy was surprised. “I’ll leave soon as I’m healed up. Get away so you don’t have to take care of it.”

Took her more than a minute to catch on, but when she did, her hand clenched around his forearm, digging into his skin.

“Leave? Why would you?” Shaking her head in denial, Buffy said “no. No. Don’t. Why?”

“Bit you sunshine, didn’t mean to, but did it all the same.” Still with his eyes closed, Spike turned his face away, into the back of the couch.

Thinking to herself very deeply for a moment, Buffy came to a very swift decision. She was the only one who could change his mind, and she knew he was doing this out of some misguided sense of nobility.

Reaching for his injured hand, Buffy began to undo the gauze wrappings, revealing his mangled flesh. Her blood had worked miracles, because the wounds didn’t look nearly as bad as they had earlier, but there was still a long way to go before he could use it again, the damage was just too extensive for the little bit of her blood he’d managed to swallow down.

His fingers twitched as the air hit them and Spike finally opened his eyes to see what she was doing. Buffy had sat up on the couch, next to his hips, his injured hand now cradled in both of hers.

“You know, slayer blood is the best healing agent for vampires” she began conversationally, “Giles never mentioned it, not until Faith poisoned Angel and then hid the antidote.”

“If you drink enough of it,” she continued, “it will heal almost fatal injuries.” She paused long enough for him to glance at her face. “And it works really well on not-so-fatal ones.”

Spike just continued to watch her, not really sure where she was going with this, but unable to turn away.

“Thing is, I was planning on offering you some anyway.”

“Slayer” he growled. “What are you sayin?”

“I think its pretty plain. This hand wouldn’t heal for weeks, even with regular human blood.” She stared straight into his eyes, willing him to understand. “I can’t let you go. I need you . . . need your help. Not ready to do this on my own yet.”

It was as much of an admission as she was willing to give. But he got it, like he always did. He always knew her, sometimes better than she knew herself. Without a word, Spike pulled her down, her head resting against his still chest.

******************************* ***************************************

He must have passed out again, because when he came to Tara was re-bandaging his hand. Seeing he was awake again, she spoke. “Dawn brought back some splints, so I figured it was best to do that while you were out. Do you feel any better?”

Snorting a “no” at her, Spike tried to sit up.

“Don’t get up yet. I’ve got some blood for you. You want it now?”

“How’s Buffy?” was her only answer.

“If I tell you she’s fine will you believe me and drink?”

There was a twinkle in his eye, as he said “you gonna answer me with questions until I say yes?”

Tara’s eyes glinted back with equal mischief “probably. You gonna believe me?”

He couldn’t help but respond, smiling back at her. “All right pet, gimme the goods.”

Holding the cup for him, Tara started speaking again. “She’s worried about you. Otherwise she’s fine. She changed her shirt for one of yours that got left here.”

At his raised eyebrows, Tara smiled a bit. “She didn’t want Xander getting stupid about it. They brought back four bags of O neg.” Looking down at the drained cup, she asked, “want another one?”

“Please pet” as she got up to leave, he touched her hand “thanks Tara.”

“When you’re feeling better, I have a problem that I’d like your advice on, if its okay?” She looked away afraid he would reject her.

“Anything. Anytime.” Spike settled back against the couch, trying to will away the pain.

He opened his eyes when he heard footsteps nearing, knowing who it was before she spoke.

“‘Lo Niblet. Come to check on me?”

“How do you feel?” There was real concern in her voice and a trace of tears as well.

“‘ve been better. Also been worse.” He shifted, trying to get comfortable.

Dawn put down the cup of blood, moving to help him. “Okay now?”

“Yeah much better.” Catching her face in his hand, Spike looked into her eyes. “Hey, Bit, I’ll be right as rain soon enough.”

“Promise?” She sniffed a bit.

“Promise” pausing a moment, he mock pouted, “where’s m’treat?”

“Oh. Oh. Right here.”

Handing it to him, she unintentionally eased his current biggest fear. “Buffy wanted to bring it in, but I whined enough to get my way. She’s worried about you” pausing barely long enough to breathe, she went on “Giles is making with the books, he’s narrowed it down, well he’s pretty sure he has, but he’s been like wanting your opinion and Buffy’s like ‘no, he needs to rest it can wait until later’ and Giles was like ‘but Buffy this is important’ and Xander popped up with something like ‘he’s a demon, he’ll be fine with what rest he’s gotten’ and then Buffy got mad at Xander and what’s with you and my sister?”

It took Spike more than a minute to catch up with everything she’d said, and longer than that to come up with an answer to her question.

“Why do you ask?” Spike figured he could buy himself a little more time, but catching sight of the look on her face, he had to re-think that.

“Spike. I saw you earlier, before you guys all left. You wanted to kiss her goodby and she wanted to let you.”

“Brat. Spyin isn’t nice.” He couldn’t think of anything else to say.

“Spying? Duh. You guys were like in plain sight.” She poked his chest playfully. “As in not behind closed doors. Fair game for peeking. So?”

Christ she was like a dog with a bone. Not giving up at all. “What of it?”

“Just wanna know. Did you? Wanna kiss my sister?” Her face was, for the moment, unreadable.

Bringing the cup to his lips, Spike muttered “yeah. Did. Do.”

“Good. She needs it.”

And with that she left him alone.

Bloody brat.

He didn’t realize that the sister in question had been standing in the doorway until her voice broke through his confused musings.

“She did nearly the same thing to me just now in the bathroom.”

“Did she now?”

“Yeah. Cept she asked me if I wanted to kiss you back.” Buffy sat down on the couch, her butt up against his legs.

“And you told her?”

“My answer was a little different from yours.”

“Oh”

She could hear the disappointment, didn’t need to see it. “Yeah. I told her that I needed to kiss you back.”

“Wha?” His pleasure was sweet to hear.

“Yeah. Just like I need to right now.” And she did.

Pulling back, Buffy said, “I actually came in to ask if you’re up to heading home. Giles has found out what it was – the dogs – and he’s going to do a bit more research at home, and” she sighed “I’m babbling again.”

“Yeah you are sunshine, but its precious. Go on, and?”

“I thought you’d be more comfy at home.”

“Yeah, would work. Couch is good but a bed would be nicer.”

Spike moved to get up, and Buffy’s arms were there to help him. Her next words were spoken so softly he thought he imagined them until he caught the look on her face.

“Wanna do this in private anyway.”





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