Title: Breathing 2/3
Author: Antennapedia
Pairing: Giles/Buffy
Rating: FRM
Warnings: A few four-letter words, some non-graphic sex, an unusual fate for a core character.
Disclaimer: I claim no ownership and am making no money.

Giles asked Buffy, over late coffee the next morning, if she would do him the favor of letting Michael get her going on horseback. He'd never had the chance to work with a real Slayer, to learn directly exactly how physically different Slayers were from normal girls, and from Potentials.

"A little friendly nepotism, huh? Give the nephew an advantage?"

"Well, yes."

"I like the way you think, Rupert. Sure."

And so after breakfast, while Dawn did slow circles around a track at a walk, Buffy got near a horse for the first time in her life. She met Otto, a white horse with brown splotches. Otto was larger and feistier than the little horse Dawn was riding. Under Michael's nervous tutelage, and Giles' watchful eye, Buffy learned the proper seat, and how to talk to her horse with subtlety and posture, how to post to trot, how to canter. Michael had to show her new things once, maybe twice if they were complicated. Buffy would essay them once, and then get them right. The hardest part had been figuring out that Otto was her partner in all this, an opinionated buddy, not a machine. But now Buffy was having a blast. She had no idea why she'd been scared of this.

Dawn was looking sulky. Michael was looking gobsmacked. Giles was explaining something to both of them, judging by the hand motions. Michael had seemed respectful before, but after that day he was worshipful. And scared. Buffy laughed at him, a little. Giles spent more time talking to him, after they had cleaned tack and horses, while Buffy fed Otto an apple and told him how awesome he was. Giles was telling Michael about Slayers, Buffy was sure, and calming him down. Buffy invested some time with Dawn as well, reassuring her that Michael was not going to be chasing her instead of Dawn.

That night, while they were talking in bed, she told Giles she'd rather not compete with Dawn like that. Show her up. Make it hard for her with the boy she was trying to impress. It wasn't fair to pit a normal girl against a Slayer.

"I thought you said you would break his arm."

"Well, only if he, you know, gets frisky. I don't want to deny Dawn a chance to date normally." Buffy sighed, and nestled herself closer. "I never did. Well, not after I became the Slayer. It was all too weird. You remember."

"I do."

"I think it's going to be easier dating a coworker."

"Pardon?"

"You know, dating my Watcher."

"More than dating, I hope."

Giles bent down to her and kissed her, and this time he let it grow into something more than just a feather-touch. Buffy put her arms around his neck and melted against him.

Then he yelped.

"Fuck!" He froze in place, then rolled away from her, wincing in pain. Buffy sat up, puzzled. Had she hurt him?

"Willow... she's kicking at... trying to break the binding. Holy hell."

His eyes glowed. It wasn't scary. They glowed green, not a livid green, but a deep green, like jade. He spoke to the air. "Willow, sweetheart. Is this what you truly want? Do you wish to be forsworn?" He flinched, in response to something happening miles away. "I cannot hold you if you are determined, my dear girl. But I must ask you to remember why you swore this to me. There is a young man dead back in Sunnydale, testimony to the dangers-- Willow, that's not helpful--"

He moaned in pain and stiffened, arching up off the bed. Buffy held his shoulder, but had no idea what to do to help. He clenched a fist and reasserted control. "Very well, Willow. You are forsworn."

Giles fell back onto the bed. He lay panting and sweating, trembling in aftermath. Buffy wiped his forehead.

"What happened?"

"Broke the binding. Lord. It hurt like blazes until I released it. Both of us, and her rather more than me. But she wouldn't let up." He sat up, swearing softly again and bracing his chest with a hand. He rummaged in the litter on the sidetable and found his cellphone. A quiet apology to whomever it was he had awakened, a few words explaining his experiences, and then he hung up.

"Buffy, I'm sorry, we'll need to go to the coven tomorrow."

"No problem, Rupert. Surprised we're not heading there tonight."

"Willow's counselor is there with her. And she's fully aware of the mess. Oh, Buffy. This isn't good." Giles let out a shuddering sigh. He slid over to her in the bed and rested his head between her breasts. She stroked his sweat-soaked hair until she was sure he was asleep. What to do?

The next morning they left Dawn with Giles' sister, to everyone's satisfaction, and Giles drove them to the coven. He did not break the limits this time, as if he were reluctant to arrive. Or as if he had thinking to do and wanted more time to do it in. He didn't speak much to Buffy during the drive.

The Westbury coven was another farm, as far as Buffy could tell, though one with more hills and trees. A big old house was surrounded by smaller buildings and a few cottages. About twenty people lived on the grounds, semi-permanently, Giles said, with a handful more in temporary residence at any time. It was a commune. Everyone had a little work to do. Giles said he'd tended the greenhouse plants when he'd lived there. When his counselor had decided he was ready to work.

He shared these little facts about the place as they walked up the drive hand-in-hand. He seemed distracted as he spoke, so Buffy stopped asking questions. Giles didn't bother to knock at the door. He opened it and went in. He went immediately to an office at the side, where he spoke with a shaggy-haired young woman briefly. Her attention was caught by a gadget on a little table in the hallway. It was a clock, she thought. Operated by sand and by magic. She was still puzzling out how it worked when a woman came down the hall. Older than Giles, gray-haired, dressed in warm colors, but somehow not warm herself. Stern, despite the smile lines at the corners of her eyes.

"There you are, Rupert," she said, as if they'd kept her waiting. Buffy frowned.

"Jane, good morning, yes, we came by straight away. This is my Slayer, Buffy Summers. Buffy, Jane Harkness, one of the coven's more experienced sorcerers."

The woman nodded at Buffy, then turned back to Giles. "Not that it's doing any good."

Buffy considered Miss Harkness. She was dressed like one of those flakey women in the beads and crystals who shopped for jewelry at the Magic Box, but Buffy could tell from her manner that she was powerful. And whip-smart. And from the set of her lips and jaw, annoyed, though Buffy didn't know with whom.

She led them down the hall the way she'd came, to a little sitting room. The room had windows that opened onto a walk that vanished into hedges. She turned and sat.

"So you're Rupert's Slayer," she said.

"Yeah," said Buffy. "Willow's best friend. At least, we were."

"You were present, then, for most of her troubles?"

"Present for a bunch of them, and sort of the victim of one of them."

"That would be the resurrection spell you're referring to? Yes. Willow has declined to discuss that spell with me." She exchanged looks with Giles.

"You're having difficulty with her."

"I'm not getting anywhere," Miss Harkness said. Her stern manner collapsed, and Buffy could see the anxiety and the fear. She stopped hating her then, and reminded herself that Willow probably needed that stern approach. No getting away with things, with this woman. No stealing forbidden books then dodging trouble by smiling cutely at an indulgent Rupert. A Rupert who couldn't imagine Willow behaving selfishly, really, because when he looked at her he saw the brave high school student, his partner in arms, not the out of control maniac she'd become over the last year.

There was a knock at the door, then it opened. Willow came in. She looked so exactly like the Willow Buffy had known for so long, complete with kitty-cat sweatshirt, that Buffy nearly burst into tears. She settled for giving Willow a huge hug. Giles hugged her too. They sat down, Giles and Buffy on the sofa, Willow on an armchair. Giles took Willow's hand and held it across the arm of the chair.

"Willow, sweetheart. I was worried about you last night. I'm worried about you still. You broke your oath."

"I had to, Giles. It was important."

"Explain it to me, Willow." He squeezed her hand.

"I had to start casting again, to get some things done. I'm under a lot of pressure right now, you know? And I have a skill, a pretty useful skill. It would help me get done what I need to do. So I felt I was ready to use it again."

"What was so important that you needed to be forsworn, Willow? Because that was a serious thing to choose. You swore your oath on your friendship with me, before the Powers. Are we no longer friends?"

"Well, Anya's been after me to repair some of the damage. 'Cause she says the insurance isn't covering everything. She's been pushing on me really hard. It's so stressful. And I felt guilty about it, because I did break all that stuff and damage all those books and things. Your stuff. So really it was about fixing our friendship." Willow made a pouty face at this juncture, exactly as if she were confessing to having snuck an extra cookie before dinner.

"Really," said Giles, quietly.

"Yeah. I kinda had to. Miss Harkness was talking about making amends, and I thought that this was the most direct way to make amends possible, you know? To fix up the shop a little."

"This required you to break your oath late at night?"

"Afternoon Sunnydale time, Giles." Willow said this in a lecturing voice. Buffy felt Giles twitch next to her. He released her hand.

"You couldn't have spoken with me first?"

"Anya was really pushing on me, Giles. You know how she can get." Now Willow was whining.

"I do. I also know that firm explanations are effective with her." Giles leaned back on the sofa, then asked casually, "Did she make her appeal in person?"

"Huh?"

"How was she putting pressure on you?"

"Oh, you know Anya."

"How, specifically?"

"Don't piss me off, Giles."

"I see," said Giles. Then, "I'll take my leave, then. I shouldn't like to piss you off, as you say." He stood up and Buffy stood with him.

"Aren't you going to hang out with your best friend, Buff?"

Buffy looked at Giles. He gave her a tiny nod, so she sat back down. "Yeah, Will. Let's hang."

Giles left the room, with Miss Harkness.

"Tell me all about England. Since I haven't been allowed to see it, other than this stinky farm."

There was nothing to do in response to that but smile and start telling stories about Bath, and Dawn on a horse, and hope that this didn't make Willow even more resentful that she was here at the coven. Buffy held in reserve the point that if Willow had been treated as she deserved, she'd be in jail now for murder, not living in this comfortable house in lovely countryside. But Willow stayed reasonable, and Buffy told her stories.

"Hey, Will, should we get the Xan-man out here? I think he'd have a great time. He needs a vacation too, I was thinking."

"No! No! No Xander. I don't want Xander to see me. Not while I'm under this much stress."

Buffy watched Willow carefully. Something was up, but she had no idea what.

Just then Miss Harkness came back in. "Willow, dear, it's time to start lunch. I believe Rupert is in the garden outside, Buffy."

Willow made a little face. "They have me doing stuff in the kitchen," she told Buffy. "Cooking. Washing dishes. That kind of stuff. It'll go faster today, though, now that I have my magic back. See ya!"

And away they went, leaving Buffy alone in the sitting room. "That wasn't so bad," she said to the ceiling.

Buffy opened the window door and stepped out. A walkway paved with flat stones wound off into the hedges. She shrugged and decided to see where it would take her. The day was bright, maybe even a bit hot for spring. Buffy ambled along the path happily, getting lost in the hedge maze, stopping to check out the flowers. Early roses, late tulips, more daffodils.

She rounded a corner, and saw Giles. He was sitting on a bench in a nook on the path, with his head close to somebody else's. A small man's, with a thatch of gray hair. The other man had an arm around Giles' shoulders. Buffy reflexively stepped off the path and behind a bush to scope the situation.

Giles wasn't physically demonstrative with people. He wasn't demonstrative with Buffy, even, and unless Buffy was crazy, they were in a relationship. But here he was with this little man's arm around him. His father? No, his father had died a while ago. They were intent on each other, talking. Buffy watched, sure that she would not be observed. Giles looked worried, but then he said something that made the other man laugh, and squeeze his arm tight around Giles' shoulders. Giles' face cleared. Buffy finally put it together, and understood who the man must be: Giles' counselor. She grinned, from her spot behind the bush.

She stepped out and continued her way along the path. Giles looked up and saw her. His face lit up, and he stood. So did the gray-haired man. Giles took her hand when she came up to them.

"Buffy, this is Alex Holder. He's been my adviser here at the coven. Alex, my Slayer." There was pride in his voice.

Buffy shook the little man's hand. Little only in comparison to Giles, she realized: he was still six inches taller than she. Mid- fifties, maybe. Lines around his eyes from smiling. He was wearing the earth-toned colors she'd seen on all the coven members, a loose brown shirt over jeans and Birkenstocks, with a chunk of crystal hanging on a braided leather loop around his neck.

"I have to go meet with some people to discuss Willow. Perhaps you'd walk with Alex? I'd like you to know one another."

"If you don't need me at the Willow thing, sure." Giles looked relieved, so Buffy gave him a reassuring squeeze, then a kiss on the cheek. He loped off down the path and disappeared behind a hedge.

Alex cocked an eyebrow at Buffy. Buffy nervously stuck her hands into the back pockets of her jeans. What was she supposed to say? *Hi. Thanks for fixing Rupert?* Why not? So she said it.

He smiled at her. "You're welcome. It was a pleasure. And I'm honored to meet the Slayer, who keeps me safe at night."

"I have a feeling you'd be safe without me," said Buffy, quirking up one side of her mouth. The man was like the others, with active power. She was maybe starting to get a feel for it, now that she'd been around several people who fizzed with magic. Tara hadn't had much; Willow had so much it went off the scales; Giles had kept his buried until recently. Now Buffy had a better sense. They all had different flavors, too. This guy was refreshing, like wind carrying the scent of water ahead of the rainstorm. Giles was more like the storm itself. Miss Harkness had been dry stones.

"You're probing me. Most interesting. I've never felt anything like that before."

"Oh! Sorry. Didn't realize it. Slayer sense telling me stuff about your magic."

"Again, interesting! Do you have a sense of my aura? Is it visual, or something else?"

"My friend Tara could see auras, but I never could. Nah. I sort of smell you. Taste you. Something in the air around you. Can you see auras?"

"Yes, I can. And I am most intrigued to see in your aura the odd colors that have always been mixed in with Rupert's. And his colors are mixed with yours. Come, let's walk. Let me show you the grounds. And you'll tell me about this sense."

Buffy followed him along the path, heading away from the house through the hedge maze. "I don't know that I can tell you much. I'm still figuring it out. Giles says I've lived so much longer than most Slayers do that I'm in new territory. I'm aware of myself in ways most of them weren't."

"Instinctive use of the skills becoming conscious. Again, intriguing."

"No wonder Giles got along with you." Alex laughed.

They came to the edge of the hedge maze and emerged onto an open field, dotted with scattered trees. The coven kept sheep, Giles had said, though Buffy couldn't see any. Alex turned left, and they walked along the line of the hedges, following a muddy path.

"I was happy to see that Rupert had let himself love you."

"You didn't know he was going to do that?"

"We never discussed it. I knew how he felt. It would be hard not to know. And now that I've seen your aura as well as his... I'm so glad for you both."

"What about our auras?"

"You're tangled together. Bound by your shared destinies. You'll find it easier now that you've decided to be together in more ways. Both of you."

"Whacky. Convenient, even. What's Willow's aura like?" Buffy asked. An idea was tickling at the back of her head.

"It's furled, very tightly. One of the alarming signs."

"Can all of you read auras? All you magic people, I mean."

"No. It's a gift that some have and some don't. Power takes many different forms. It's unique to each person. One of my gifts is reading people. Perception and insight. Most of us would have been unaware you were probing, for instance."

"My gift is death," said Buffy.

Alex stopped on the track and turned to her. He held the chunk of crystal in his hand for a moment, eyes closed. His face was serious. But when he opened his eyes again, they crinkled at the edges.

"I don't know that I would trust everything the First Slayer tells you. Some of it was self-serving nonsense. Her gift was death. Your gift is, hmmm, something else. You might ask yourself what you have that other Slayers did not." The little man smiled, and tucked the crystal back into his shirt.

"And you're not going to tell me, are you." This didn't annoy Buffy nearly as much as it should have. "What's Rupert's gift?"

"Ah! You'll see tomorrow, when his power is returned to him."

Buffy wasn't entirely looking forward to that. She had a feeling Willow wasn't going to like it.

***

They had dinner with Anya that night. Giles called her on the drive to Bath from the coven house. An hour later, while Buffy was stirring the sauce pan Giles had told her to stir, Anya popped in.

"Always easiest to home in on the Slayer," Anya said. "Very recognizable resonance signature. Where is Giles?"

"Right here, dear." Giles came up behind her and hugged her.

Anya beamed up at him. "The insurance company will pay for everything. And I mean everything. That extra-expensive policy you took out that I complained about so often turns out to have been a wise investment. They were unable to point out any loopholes. And taking your suggestion of having the lawyer present and looming was most effective. Good work, Giles!"

"And excellent work from you sticking it out. Good news."

"So, like, why were you bugging Willow to fix stuff, then?"

"Huh?"

Giles pulled out a chair for Anya. "So you haven't been visiting Willow?"

"No."

Buffy exchanged a look with Giles, then turned back to her saucepan. Giles poured a glass of something for Anya, then sat with her at the table. "Willow's been claiming you have. As an excuse, I think, for casting again. She claims she's been fixing things at the Magic Box."

"She hasn't, that I know of. And if she had, I would have asked her after the insurance investigator made his decision, not before. That was only an hour ago. Morning, my time."

Giles stood and took over the cooking from Buffy. She sat with Anya at the kitchen table, sipping her wine slowly, and listening to the two of them talk about rebuilding plans. Anya wanted to relocate to Paris, which had a significant and stable magical population she felt was underserved. Giles argued for London, but had no answer when Anya pointed out that the presence of the Council depressed demon activity, which meant a smaller market. Either way, EU regulations would be a pain, which was in turn an argument for New York.

The amiable bickering continued through dinner-- lunch for Anya, as she enjoyed pointing out. In the end, Giles yielded and they settled on Paris, as a lovely place for Anya to live, and for Buffy and Giles to visit. Anya popped away again fizzing with triumph and the Pinot Noir, Giles' signature on the stack of insurance documents in her bag. Buffy was a little fizzy herself, on two glasses of wine and the prospect of getting to know Paris someday. Such a change, for the small-town Slayer who'd given up on snatching even a weekend on the coast.

In bed that night, the soft kisses left her unsatisfied. She climbed on top of Giles and pressed her knee between his thighs.

"Buffy, love, it still hurts to breathe."

"Soon?" She kissed up his throat, tasting her way to his ear. She took the earring into her mouth and sucked, gently.

"Oh, God, yes, soon." He moaned under her hands. She lifted his t- shirt and explored up his belly to his chest. He grasped her face and kissed her open-mouthed, deep and slow. Buffy could feel his body harden against her thigh, still perfectly controlled, still a gentleman, but perhaps she could coax him. She brushed a hand under his pajama waistband. He shivered and gasped against her mouth. His hips moved. Then he was kissing her hard, rolling them so that he pressed her down into the bed. He slid his hand down, and between, stroking slowly.

She froze, remembering cold hands pulling her open, a cold body inside hers. Giles' hand went away, and he gently extricated his legs from hers. She shivered. He turned her over and nuzzled up behind her. The blanket was up to her ears, but she was cold. Cold everywhere except the places where he was pressed against her.

"I'm sorry," he said, murmuring into her hair. "It's too soon. For both of us."

"It still hurts to breathe," Buffy said.

***

The coven took Willow's stolen power from her the next morning. They gathered in their big meeting room and simply did it.

They stood around Willow in a circle, about twenty of them. They had confined Willow inside a crystalline sphere. Buffy and a handful of others stood outside, watching. Buffy could feel pressure in the air, something hot. A great deal of power was present in the room, angry power. It was coming from Willow, roiling out. Hot, smoky. Not a good taste. Then the coven people joined hands, and it damped down. The circle was containing it. There was no ceremony, just the joined hands, then a chant in some language Buffy couldn't recognize at all. Giles led it.

Willow was supposed to be lying on her back, on pillows where she would be comfortable, but she refused to stay down. She paced restlessly inside the circle.

Her head was enveloped in a green glow. "No," she said. "You can't. That's mine now. You can't take it from me."

Miss Harkness was angry. "It's stolen power, Willow Rosenberg. You will return it to its rightful owner."

"Him? It's wasted on him. He sits on it. Hides in his little office with his books hugged to his chest. Afraid. Afraid to do anything. It should stay with me. I'll use it. I'll do good with it. You'll see."

"You will return the power to its rightful owner."

"I won't! And you can't force me! That would be wrong! You're abusing me! This is--"

"As you abused me when you forced it from me?" Giles said this quietly but Willow closed her mouth with a snap. She shook herself, then bowed her head, very very slowly. Her face contorted.

The green glow rose straight up from Willow in a column. The crystal sphere turned green where it intersected. Then an arc sprang from the sphere to Giles' chest. He cried out and was held. The power pumped from Willow to sphere to Giles in slow pulses. Maybe a third spilled over to the others in the circle, but most stayed with him. He seemed to get ten feet taller as it flowed into him. He grew. His hair curled. His skin glowed. Light shone out from him.

It went on and on for what felt like forever, ozone crackling and the oppressive heated containment pressing down on Buffy. But when she looked at the sand-clock afterward, she saw had taken less than an hour. At the end of it, when they released the chant, Willow collapsed into a heap in the edge of the sphere, at the point nearest Giles. The coven broke the circle of hands, and the binding sphere vanished with a sound like a million fairy wineglasses breaking.

And Giles took a deep breath, and rolled his shoulders. He closed his eyes, and raised his face to the ceiling. Then he looked down at Willow, crumpled at his feet. He was angry, but bottled up. A storm beating on the windows.

Buffy could feel him and smell his power now. She knew this flavor already. She'd first met it when she walked into the library at Sunnydale High, and the odd shy man in the too-heavy tweed jacket had smiled at her so eagerly. Giles had been using his magic all along, mostly likely unconsciously. His office in the library. His Sunnydale flat. The entire Magic Box. They'd all smelled like this to Buffy. This power was not about binding or striking or breaking. Even the justified anger boiling off him now was in conflict with this power.

This power had turned those places into havens. Filled his flat in Bath with growing things. Made him the person they'd all run to when injured, instinctively.

At home that night, before he came to bed, Giles stood before the bathroom mirror. Buffy was in the doorway, watching. He pulled his shirt off. The burn in the center of his chest, over his heart, was gone. His bruising had nearly vanished. Even the scarring on his side, where the spear had breached him, had faded.

He inhaled deeply once, then held his hand to his left side. "Ribs are better, but not completely healed. And my ankle is good."

"Handy," Buffy said.

"Very. Normally one can't heal oneself. The healing gift is strictly an unselfish one. I wonder. Willow may have... Interesting. She might have been guiding the power on its way back. Such contradictory signals. She fights, then cooperates, then fights again as if she had no memory of her earlier decision. Such conflict she must be feeling."

Buffy played with her hair, thinking. She ought to have figured this out already.

"So you can heal stuff? That's your gift?"

"Not exactly. It's more, ah, nurturing? Assisting natural processes? I can't kill houseplants if I try."

Buffy laughed, and they went to bed.

***

They'd been in England for three weeks. Dawn had been spending most of her time with Giles' sister and nephew. She'd chattered endlessly about Michael on the phone with Buffy until one day she'd clammed up. Buffy knew what that meant, and told Giles to remind his sister what Slayers could do if their sisters lost their virginity one minute before the age of twenty-one.

Giles and Buffy had spent about half their time at the coven. They had, without needing to discuss it, chosen not to be apart. They still weren't lovers. In one sense, anyway, Buffy thought. They were lovers in all the other senses. Giles was waiting for something. Waiting for her.

They meditated in the morning. Cleaned house. Went shopping. Cooked together. Read novels. Trained, with emphasis on the more esoteric and mystical topics. Buffy had told Giles all about her new sense for magic power, and they explored it deeply together.

Buffy hadn't Slain since she left Sunnydale. There were no vampires to Slay. When she practiced extending her senses, she felt nothing, nothing for miles.

She hadn't had this kind of peace since she'd woken up as the Slayer.

They were at the coven again, visiting Willow. They walked with her over the fields, in patchy sunlight. To Buffy's eyes, darkness clung to Willow. She sensed the hot abrasive power circling around Willow's head, like sand blown by a stiff wind. It was wiggy, as before, on the plane. Even when Willow was talking about how she'd learned to make tarts, treacle tarts, and was burbling about the Dormouse, something had Buffy nervous. Maybe it was the way Willow complained about being forced to do it mundane-style.

When the rainclouds blew in, Giles turned them back to the house. They made it inside scant minutes before the clouds burst. Willow went off to the kitchens, where she would be assisting with dinner. Giles went off to consult with Miss Harkness. Buffy, left to her own devices, decided to go up to their room and think.

The coven had put them into a little room under the roof, at the top of the house. Buffy loved this room. Spattering rain on the windows made it feel cozy. Buffy pushed up the window. The wood had swelled in the wet, and it stuck in the runners for a moment. A cautious application of Slayer strength, and it squeaked up. She knelt at the window for a long time, arms laid along the sill and her chin on her arms. The rain blew in, now and then, and dampened her arms and face. It smelled wonderful outside. Summer rain, and wet grass, and flowers she couldn't identify. It was so green out there. Life bursting everywhere. So unlike the scorched brown of her semi-desert home. How had Giles stood it, when he'd moved to the Hellmouth? To unforgiving sun and dust and eucalyptus and dead grass on the hills? To freeways and strip malls?

Because he'd had to stand it, just like she had to stand it. The brutal reality of the calling they shared, that they would go where they needed to go and fight until they were dead. At least in her case. Giles would be allowed peace when she was dead. Though she suspected, from what he'd said of last summer, that her death had brought anything but peace to him. His time here at the coven, over the winter, he had described as spiritual recentering. But Buffy would have called it intensive therapy. He'd been broken.

It was this place, the time he'd spent here, that had recentered Giles. From the moment he'd found Jenny Calendar dead in his bed, to the moment she'd stormed out of the training room, and the moments of hell in between. He'd laid them all aside here. England, this coven, this house, here, and he'd finally recovered.

The twilight lasted forever, long hours of slow sunset under rainclouds. Buffy was thinking of moving, of maybe going to seek out Giles, when someone tapped at the door. It opened immediately. Giles, stepping through from the yellow-lit hallway. Buffy blinked in the light. He closed the door behind himself and came over to her. His step was noiseless, his stance contained, right hand in his pocket. Buffy recognized it as the posture he used when he wanted to minimize his height, and the breadth of his shoulders.

Buffy turned back to the window. He laid his hands on her back. His thumbs brushed over her, softly massaging along her spine.

"How'd it go?"

"As we expected. There is a deep wellspring of resistance in her. Surface compliance. Her control has improved, which would ordinarily be encouraging. But in this case--"

"Better control of rogue powers."

"Mm. She will not cease the petty uses of magic, even to demonstrate that she is trustworthy. We are asking her to stop using her right hand, when its use has become nearly unconscious. And she cannot understand why. Or will not."

"Conclusion is... obvious, I guess."

"Yes. They'll convene next week, give her one last chance. It will be, well, as wrenching as losing her right arm would be." He stilled his hands on her back.

"Will you help?"

"Yes. I must. I owe it to her to be with her. I gave her the books. I failed to supervise her."

"Rupert, you weren't sent to be her Watcher."

"No. But I was voluntarily something else to her, and to Xander."

They fell silent. Buffy thought carefully about how to say what she wanted to say next.

"It doesn't hurt me to breathe any more. Does it hurt you?"

Buffy felt him shake against her back, a few quick silent laughs. He'd laughed so much, since that moment when he'd come through the Magic Box door.

"Shall we go to bed, then?" he said. Buffy knelt up and slid the window most of the way down.

There were few mysteries left about Giles' body, for Buffy, after weeks spent in such intimacy. She knew that he had muscle in his shoulders and arms. She'd seen his chest, and knew about the scattering of graying hair there and on his soft belly. She'd been kissed by him more times than she could count. But it was a revelation anyway, to see him at last, to see him looking at her with breathless appreciation. To touch him, and feel his warmth and his pulse. The sweat on his forehead, on his chest, between his legs. The scarring on his body. Such contrast with the icy dry perfection of her demon lovers, the statues.

Giles, alive, a thousand million little fires alight inside him.

"Now," she told him.

Giles rolled onto his back, carrying her over with him. "Here," he said. "Like this. We can stop, any time you wish to."

Buffy rose up and let him gently guide her downward. Until the moment she felt him deep inside, she realized, she'd been tensed, waiting for the pain. But there was only pleasure. His eyes were nearly closed, and he had an expression she'd never seen on him before, and never imagined she would see. Her Watcher, her best friend, in ecstasy. Buffy rested atop him, enjoying that expression, until he opened his eyes and smiled at her. He laid hands on her hips and encouraged her to move. She lifted then sank down onto him again, slowly, then again. He made a little sound.

"Is this right?"

"Lovely. Perfect. Wonderful."

"Never done it this way before."

He made the sound again. "Why on earth not?"

"They, uh, didn't like it."

"Unimaginative louts. You need an entirely better class of lover."

"Working on that right now," Buffy said. This was new, talking and making little jokes while making love. Giles slid a hand down her hip, circling her thigh around and in, and grazed his thumb against her. Speech became impossible. He was lifting his hips to meet hers, matching her deliberate pace. Slow, soft, building gently but inevitably. Buffy's breath came short, but it was difficult. The last time...

Giles started talking, then, whispering to her. His voice was soft and husky. "Show me, Buffy. Show yourself to me. Let yourself feel it. Yes, like that."

When Buffy was still again, she looked down to see Giles smiling up at her. His face was sweaty and flushed. He gently urged her off, then got out of bed to fetch a handkerchief. Buffy hadn't even noticed him coming, she'd been so carried away by her own moment. Something to look forward to, then, the sight of Giles' face. When they made love again. And they would.

Giles returned to her, and wrapped himself around her.

Buffy worried that everyone could see it on her face, the next morning, because she was unable to stop grinning. Or maybe it was written all over her aura. She helped Alex make breakfast for fifteen people, and burbled at him the whole time. He didn't say anything, though, just lined up waffle batter for Buffy to cook.

When Buffy finally carried a plate out to the dining hall for herself, it was just the four of them there: Willow, Giles, Alex, and Buffy. Giles and Willow had finished already. She slathered on the butter and the syrup and dug in. She felt a touch on her foot: Giles, nudging her. She smiled at him, and he blushed.

Willow glanced up from her empty plate, at Buffy's face and at Giles'. Buffy saw the moment she added it up, and snapped: Willow left the building. Eyes black, hair black, and the crackle of power in the air Buffy remembered from the night Willow went crazy.

"Daddy nailed big sister last night," Willow said. "She wants to be the mommy, but that was Joyce. And he fucked her, too. Who's next? Anya? No, I know who! Little Dawnie. Fresh, untouched, a sweet strawberry for the corrupted to corrupt."

And then whoosh, veins, eyes, hair, back to normal: Willow again, collapsed onto the floor and sobbing that she didn't mean it, she didn't know what had come over her. Giles was white in the face, and his hand was clenched into a fist.

He spun on his heel and stalked out. Buffy stood watching Willow sob, in the arms of her counselor, then left to find Giles. He was in their room. The suitcase was open on the bed, the drawers pulled open. Buffy sat on the window seat and watched him throwing clothing into their bag. Then she got up and helped.

"Where to?"

"How would you feel about London for a few days?"

"You owe me shopping."

"That I do."

***

London was exciting at first. Giles got them into a hotel he knew, right on the same block as the British Museum. He gave Buffy the extra-special insider-knowledge tour, with extra details on the mummies and the Babylonian stuff. And the Assyrian stuff. He managed to make the difference interesting to Buffy, which nobody else had managed. His drily witty explanations to her attracted a little audience of tourists, who followed them like ducklings from exhibit to exhibit. They eventually made him self-conscious. When he started stammering, she threaded her arm through his and made him take her off to the cafe in the central courtyard. Which, he confessed to her, was new to him, and vaguely upsetting. His home country had changed while he was away from it.

He took her to see a play, something set in a drawing room that made her laugh, and then to dinner. They walked back to the hotel room through finally-dark streets, a little lit up from the wine.

Back in the tiny hotel room, Buffy brushed her teeth, and tried to think about settling into bed, but couldn't. Restless. She at first tried to blame coffee in the late afternoon, then remembered her lessons from Giles. Look inside. Trust her Slayer instinct. Trust herself.

Buffy extended her senses, probing out into the city spreading far around her, and almost quailed.

"Rupert, the Council is here, right?"

"Yes," he said, from his position sprawled across the bed. "In this part of the city, even."

"And they train Potentials here, right?"

"Yes. What's the matter?"

"Why are there so many vampires here? So many. My God, Rupert. Hundreds, probably. Don't they kill any in training?"

"I-- They're supposed to. But remember, Potentials aren't the same as full Slayers."

"Useless jerks. Sorry, but wow. They're nearby. This place needs a good cleaning." Buffy went to her suitcase and began pulling out Slay- clothes. Boots, jeans, dark jacket with pockets. Giles watched her silently for a moment, then got up to put on his boots. "You don't have to--"

"Yes, I do. I'm your Watcher. And besides, I know the city."

And thus began a hard night of Slaying. Buffy found the urge to hunt was strong in her, possibly because of how many there were. Her Slayer instincts battered at her, telling her to keep going. Find the one in the next block and stake it. Extinguish it. Scatter its dust like cigarette ash in the air. A policeman stopped them, once, as they ghosted through Coram's Fields on the prowl. Giles showed his Watcher identification, and the man silently saluted them and vanished.

They killed an even dozen, and hadn't managed to stray more than a mile from the hotel. Giles said there'd be more in the seedier areas, the docks, the older sections of town. Whitechapel, where the memory of past horrors was thick. But even here, in Bloomsbury, hard by the Council building itself, there were vampires.

They fought three at once by the fountain at the center of Russell Square. They had only stakes with them. Giles with a sword was formidable, but Giles did not have a sword. They stood back to back and fought. Buffy took on two at once; Slayer's privilege.

She fought in a holding pattern at first, while she evaluated them. The usual moderate skill, with typical vamp strength and speed. The only tricky bit here was handling the numbers.

Opening to stake the first. Buffy spun in and punched with the stake. Bullseye. But it left her off-balance, unable to follow through with any kind of grace. The second vamp didn't waste her opening. Her high kick caught Buffy in the head and sent her hard into a bench. Buffy tried to catch herself against the back, but missed. Her wrist popped, and she fell to the ground. Just then she heard the implosive crunch and fading scream that meant Giles had staked his. Buffy flipped to her feet and launched herself over the benchback toward the last one. Giles kicked it from behind toward her, and her arc ended in collision with the vamp, stake-point first. She sailed through dusty air, hit the pavement rolling, and came on her feet again stake at the ready.

Giles was bent over, breathing hard. Buffy paced around him for a moment, checking for further threats. Nothing nearby. Then she stopped and pulled up her right sleeve. Her wrist was already swollen and discolored. She gritted her teeth. It hurt. Nothing she couldn't deal with. She got this sort of injury once a week.

"Allow me."

Giles laid his hands on her arm and closed his eyes. Buffy felt a breath of air, the scent of water in it, and she was healed. She'd have healed by the morning, anyway, but to heal in minutes?

"Nice trick, sweetie."

He was probing her wrist, checking his work. "Boost to already boosted healing. I can't do that with an ordinary human being. I merely nudge things along."

"Huge help anyway. We make a good team."

Giles flashed her a little smile. He looked tired, though. Buffy grasped his wrist and craned to read his watch. Four in the morning, and the sky already looking a little white in the east. She led him back to their hotel, and they slept like the dead until noon. Woke up ravenous, with hair and skin itching from demon-dust.

That was how it was every day they were in London. In the afternoon, Giles played tour guide. Buffy bought clothes. Giles watched her at play in the shops, and smiled. Their evenings started with a play or a movie, followed by dinner, followed by a frantic struggle with each other back in the hotel bed. And then it was hunting until dawn. They had to range farther each night to find what Buffy was driven to hunt. At no time did they see any sign of other demon hunters in action, of the Watcher-Potential pairs that Giles said were usually to be found. It was beginning to piss Buffy off.

The city smelled of gasoline, asphalt, bricks, vampire dust. Even the parks, with their black swans and lush greenery, were veneers over the stench of vampire to Buffy.

After four nights of this, and more than thirty kills, Buffy begged Giles to take her back home. To Bath. He sighed with relief, and began packing their bags. They took the train from Paddington. Buffy watched the city roll away and the countryside sweep into view. Trees, hedges, green fields. She felt herself relaxing. No fighting, not for a little while. But Buffy knew where her duty lay.

"Giles, if I stay here with you..."

Giles looked up from his paperback. "Hmm?"

"I'll need to clean up London. Not at that insane pace. We'd get ourselves killed if we tried to keep that up. But it has to be done."

"You're the Slayer. If you say it must be done, we'll do it. Might arrange some backup, though. Or perhaps simply bring Potentials along to watch and learn." He shrugged slightly.

"Staying here would be okay?"

Giles' eyes crinkled. "Of course. We'll have to sort out your visa, but the Council will help."

"The Hellmouth will be okay without me?"

"If you're drawn here, Buffy, you're drawn here. The Slayer always goes where she is needed."

"Trust my instincts."

"They're well-trained instincts, love. Worth trusting."

"Huh." Buffy looked out the train window again, thinking not about London and vampires, but about Westbury and Willow.

***

They returned to Avebury for a few days, to catch up with their families and be where the air didn't smell of vampires.

Dawn and Michael were indeed an item, though an innocent one under Maeve's watchful eye. Horse-riding, trips to the cinema with groups of local friends, and kisses stolen when no one was watching. Dawn confessed the kisses to Buffy in a sister bonding session, with nail- painting and fashion-magazine sneering. Buffy had to suppress the urge to forbid all of it. But she remembered what she'd been like at sixteen. Kisses would be as far as it went, and forbidding them was the fastest way of ensuring that more happened.

She drew the line at giving Dawn advice on the best way to kiss, though.

"Why not?" said Giles. They were walking hand-in-hand through a field, shin-deep in wet grass and wildflowers. And mud, but they were dressed for it. The morning had been wet, but the sun was out now. Buffy never tired of this weather. It changed so often she never knew what to expect. And the flat Salisbury plains were lovely. Sun and bees and flowers and birds, and something scurrying away from their feet in the tall grass.

"What? Are you going to tell Michael how to do it?"

"If he asks. Though he's not likely to. He's still in shock at our violation of Council regulations."

Buffy giggled. "How many have we violated?"

"Possibly all of them, except the ones about sacrificing infants to Ba'al."

"That was Lurconis, and I Slayed it. No thanks to you, candy-man."

"Hey!" The chase was on, across sodden fields. Buffy let Giles catch her at the boundary line of oaks. He seized her and bore her down to the grass, then rolled with her.

"You're getting me muddy!"

"Slay me! I'm a mud demon!"

She flipped them and pinned him. The giggle fit was as bad as it had been in the back of the Magic Box. Giles was stretched on his back, pointing at her, laughing. Buffy leaned over him and kissed his muddy face. The kiss grew and was wild in moments, open-mouthed, hungry. Giles rolled over her. His hands dug deep into the grass at her shoulders.

"God! Can you feel it?"

Buffy could: power, magic power, in the air, grounding itself through them. Giles' power, if he knew it, the complement to hers.

They wriggled damp clothing out of the way and took each other there, in the grass. They lay together in the grass afterwards, holding hands, just staring up peacefully. At last Buffy could ignore the mud no longer. She sat up.

"Your back is all grass." Giles' hand brushed over her shirt.

"So are your knees. Not just your jeans. Your knees."

"Bloody hell." Giles began giggling again.

They dripped mud as they walked back to the house.

***

The coven had convened again, over thirty of them this time. Every man and woman who'd been associated with them over the last decade. Buffy and Giles joined them in their meeting. It had the feeling of a trial, with Willow arguing for her right to retain her power. But she argued in vain. When Giles stood to add his voice to those arguing against her, to say that he was convinced she would walk the path of destruction if left alone, Willow caved. Her choices were to be bound by the coven itself to live her life isolated on the grounds here, or to surrender her powers. She agreed to yield her powers, all of them.

This was not a group given to ritual and ceremony. Once agreement was given, they stood and cleared the workspace of chairs, and ranged themselves around her in a circle. They cast the binding sphere again.

"Wait," said Willow. "Don't I get a last meal or anything like that? You're just gonna do it?"

The sense of heated oppression Buffy had felt before was back, redoubled. The air in the room was hard to breathe. Her lungs were burning. The coven joined hands. They began a murmured chant.

"You can't do this. I need more time!"

"You agreed," Buffy told her.

"Not to having it done right away, I didn't!" Willow blackened and her voice changed. She floated into the air. "I knew I should have seduced you, Rupert. I knew I should have gotten over the nausea and just done you. That's all it takes with you, I guess. You'd be fighting on my side now if I had."

This time Giles was untouched. He was again the man who'd swept into the Magic Box and knocked Willow back. Stern, unreachable. Buffy couldn't say the same; she was ready to haul off on Willow. Or run out. But she forced herself to hold still and just watch.

Something exploded outward from Willow and slammed into the binding sphere. It held. Then Willow laughed, and did it again, and the sphere shattered outward. Shards of power sliced out and into people. They fell. The circle of hands was broken. Giles and Miss Harkness stood, however, still holding hands. Together they sent power slamming into Willow. She countered with a bolt that sent Giles flying back into the wall. Buffy heard something snap when he hit.

He slid to the floor and didn't get up. Buffy caught his look, and stayed back, out of Willow's sightline.

"Giles, Giles, are you okay?" Willow was human again in an instant. She ran to him.

Giles lay where she'd thrown him. He pushed himself up with his right hand. His left arm hung at his side. He wasn't moving it at all. He was also showing no signs of pain. He held out his right arm to Willow. She collapsed against him and wept into his shoulder. Buffy saw his hand moving in Willow's hair, his mouth bent to her ear.

The room exploded into activity, people running out to call for medical help, people running in to tend to Giles and the other injured people.

Miss Harkness led Willow away. Buffy moved carefully, staying behind the incoming medic, still out of Willow's sight. The second the door closed behind her, she was in motion to Giles' side. She stayed out of the way of the medic, holding his right hand while the man worked. Questions, temporary splint, then her shoulder under his arm, helping him up. And another trip to another emergency room, this time a British one. Just like the American ones she'd seen too much of, except that there were different names for everything.

"This is becoming tiresome," said Giles.

"How bad is it?"

"Not at all. Simple fracture of the ulna. A couple of weeks in this. Hurts like the devil. Can't afford painkillers."

Buffy examined his plastic cast: left arm, from elbow to wrist. She handed his cellphone back to him. "Three calls while you were getting rayed and splinted. All three from coven people, one from Miss Harkness. They sounded pretty grim. Miss Harkness wants a call as soon as you can."

Giles held the phone in his right hand, eyes closed for a moment. He looked defeated.

A coven member drove them back from the hospital. Buffy sat in front and talked to the man, who told her about what was involved in making magical artifacts. It sounded interesting. Buffy thought that maybe she should commission a sword from this guy some time. She asked him more questions. She was desperate to have something to think about that was not Willow, and the tone of Giles' voice as he spoke into his cellphone. He was on the phone the whole drive, hanging up only when they turned into the coven's driveway.

But when they went in, he didn't go in search of anyone, not even Willow. He silently led Buffy up the creaking narrow staircase to their little room in the eaves. The windows were open to the late afternoon glow. It had been a lovely day; sweet-scented warm air pushed at the curtains.

Buffy sat in the window and watched him pace. The plastic cast was wrapped in red strapping. He wore a baggy black shirt; his sleeve was rolled up above the cast. He held his arm across his body as he walked. It obviously hurt him. He couldn't heal it. If somebody else's arm had been broken, he could have sped the healing process along. But the magic couldn't be used selfishly, he'd said. He'd surrendered it to Willow once to shock her back to humanity. That trick wouldn't work a second time.

Giles stopped and knelt on the window seat next to her. He stared outward, at the afternoon skies. Buffy look at the fine lines at the corners of his eyes, at the corners of his mouth, across his forehead. His hair was starting to gray at the temples. And yet there was something in him stronger and more vital than she'd ever seen in him, not even that first year they were together. Power in his hands, in his eyes. He had always been a striking man. She'd admitted that in private moments even when she'd thought him the oldest, driest, stuffiest man on the planet. Now she knew him entirely, and she didn't have words any more for him.

She'd found someone strong enough to be with her. Strong enough all on his own not to be threatened. Strong where she wasn't, as she was where he wasn't.

"They're going to have to kill her," he said.

"I know." Buffy had been tensed and ready to Slay that afternoon. If Willow had kept fighting after she'd broken Giles' arm, Buffy might have done it. Willow sent her inner Slayer into overdrive.

"They tried knocking her out, drugs in her tea. She nearly killed Jane when she detected it. Too much power. No conscience. One person dead already. How many more if we don't act?"

Buffy said nothing.

"Why? Why can't we just lie back and let someone else deal with it? Why does it always have to be us? Are we never granted any peace?"

Buffy didn't like to say it, because she didn't entirely like to believe it, but they didn't get vacations. Not really. They were who they were, all the time. And when the world needed them to act, they acted. She thought Giles knew that as well as she did, though.

"Buffy, could you possibly... I should like... I know it's a dreadful time, but I should very much like to be with you now."

"Come on, sweetie."

She drew him with her to the bed. They undressed each other slowly. Giles didn't say anything, just pulled her down onto the bed alongside him. He tugged her leg up over his hip, and slid himself home.

They were on their sides, facing each other. Buffy had never made love this way before, but she liked it. Giles moved slowly, taking his time, caressing with his good hand, making it last. When she came around him, he groaned, and began moving more urgently. Buffy watched his face, head thrown back, eyes closed, his body tensing as he approached his moment. The gasp and shudder, then the warmth of his release flooding into her-- she came again when she felt it. He leaned his sweaty forehead against hers, breathing hard. His arm shook where he'd wrapped it around her shoulders. It took Buffy a while to realize it was because he was weeping.

Buffy wasn't happy either, but she also wasn't ready to just break down about it. Her mind turned the problem over and over.

"Sweetie, there has to be something we can do. Something that isn't just sitting here waiting for the end."

"What? What's left to try?"

"We have to call Xander. He needs to know, and he needs a chance to be here. Willow gets one last shot, and he's it." She ought to have insisted on this weeks ago. Trusted her instincts.

Giles leaned over her to rummage on the nightstand. He punched at his phone; the lights from the buttons and screen glowed green on his face.

"Xander, it's Giles. I-- I have some bad news. Nothing drastic, not not yet, anyway. No, Buffy's fine. She's right here. Willow is, well. Let me explain." He did so, with the clear phrasing that Buffy recognized as Giles in deep Watcher mode. No stammering, no flinching; all duty and detachment. Later he would allow himself to feel for the woman he'd thought of as his daughter.

"We can delay for a day or so," he said. "She's not an active threat. Yet. But she will be when she figures out what we're planning. We have enough time for you to get here. Don't worry about the money. Just get yourself on a plane, and we'll take care of the rest."

He silently handed the phone to Buffy. "Get on the next flight, Xan," Buffy said. "Get over here now."

NEXT