Giles opened one eye and blearily looked at the sunlight falling through the parted bed-curtains.

He had no idea what the time was, but it only seemed like five minutes ago that he and Ethan had staggered back to their room from their night with Ian. The dawn sun had already been brightening the room, but they'd just pulled the curtains tight around the bed and collapsed into each other's arms. Clearly the dogs, who were now curled up together at the foot of the bed, had opened them again since.

The three of them had chatted drunkenly throughout the night, sitting close to each other and touching a lot. They had taken turns in the middle of the huddle without any deliberation to do things that way; it just happened that that was how things went. The mood had been exceptionally mellow, and they had, all three of them, spoken about their youth, Ian sharing many hilarious tales of his antics with Derek. Giles had laughed at the time, but with hindsight, the stories seemed a little tragic.

There had been more smoking, more drinking, and rather a lot of kissing, and in some ways, it had felt very much like his old London days with Ethan. The acceptance and relaxed atmosphere had been the same at the very least. When Ian had finally staggered to his feet and announced he wanted to see the inside of his sheets before breakfast, Giles had half-expected the older man to accompany him and Ethan to their bedroom. But Ian had left on his own.

Giles turned his head enough to look at Ethan; he lay against Giles' shoulder still asleep. Watching Ian leave alone had only driven home just how lucky he and Ethan were to have found each other again. Things could have been so very different.

Ethan stirred. His eyes didn't open, but his hand was dragged up to wipe his mouth, and then he grunted and nuzzled at Giles. "Gobacktosleep," he mumbled.

Giles smiled; Ethan was so very in tune with him now. He dropped a kiss on Ethan's forehead. "Not sure I can. But I'm content to just lie here and watch you."

There was a pause, and then, "You brooding?"

"Actually rather the opposite," Giles replied. "I'm counting my blessings."

"Most people count sheep." Ethan pulled back a little and opened a single eye.

He smiled, feeling whimsical. "Most people don't have an Ethan."

The other eye opened, and Ethan smiled sleepily at him. "You have a very sticky, smelly Ethan currently. I smell as if someone has poured whisky all over me. Can't think why."

"You were asking for it," Giles said serenely.

Ethan's eyes opened wider. "Do I always get what I ask for?"

"That depends."

"Do I get a kiss? Despite the aforementioned odour de distillery?" As Giles obligingly touched his lips to his lover's, Ethan combed the fingers of one hand through the hair at Giles' temple. "Do you want to talk about last night?"

"What exactly about last night?" Giles asked, closing his eyes briefly in pleasure at Ethan's touch.

"Any of it, really." Ethan gave a little shrug, then he grinned. "You haven't told me off about falling in the river yet."

"Mm." He nuzzled Ethan's neck. "Perhaps later. I'm feeling too agreeable to lecture effectively right now."

Ethan was quiet as Giles did that, tipping his head to the side obligingly, but then he asked, "Felt like me, didn't he?"

Ah, Ian. "In some ways, yes," Giles replied quietly. There had certainly been more than a hint of familiarity in kissing and touching Ian, more so when Giles added his magic.

"It's strange how much family I suddenly have," Ethan said thoughtfully. "After sod all deserving the name for so long, I now seem surrounded by kindred of one kind or another. He believes he's going to die soon, you know. I think Keri must have predicted something. Do you think he was the sundered pair survivor your Gran met?"

When Ethan slipped so rapidly between tangents, it was hard to know which to answer. Luckily, Giles had had enough experience that he was able to go with the flow, answering the last question and keeping the first comments in mind to come back to. "I'm almost certain he is. I'm fairly sure if there had been another survivor at Devon we would have heard about it by now."

"I'm unclear when Derek died," Ethan admitted. "Do you think it was before we met? Would we still have been drawn to each other if there had still been a complete pair in existence?"

"Yes," Giles replied, absolutely certain on that point.

Ethan seemed to be focused on the canopy roof, although his fingers still moved restlessly through Giles' hair. "Would we still have been, well, us? Can there be two pairs coexistent?"

"We would have been us. The magic, the... guardianship... while indisputably a part of us, is far from the whole."

Ethan hadn't exactly been talking loudly, but now became quieter still. "I wouldn't like to think that we only exist as a partnership thanks to Ian's torment and loss."

Giles pulled him into a closer embrace. "We don't. I promise."

Ethan went very willingly, pressing his body against Giles' and maximising the skin-contact. He took one of Giles' hands in his, however, and pressed it to the top of his arm. Ah, where the brand of the badger was.

Letting his fingers trace the outline of the magical brand, Giles thought about the night before and the one great epiphany that had come out of it for him. "You're right," he said softly. "Ian does feel like you -- I can even say that the Chaos in him attracts me to him the same way it does to you. But you're still different."

"Well, we're not twins," Ethan agreed, clearly not understanding what Giles had meant.

"No, you're not," Giles agreed, nuzzling. "You're the one I'm in love with."

Ethan pulled back and gave him a puzzled look. "What am I missing here?"

"Ian has all the same Chaos attractions for me that you do. But I'm not in love with him." He pulled back enough to meet Ethan's eyes. "I love you because of who you are, not because of what you are."

It seemed to take another few seconds for the confusion of Ethan's face to fade, and then he made a high-pitched sound and buried his face against Giles' shoulder. "You do this deliberately," he said, his voice muffled.

"I do what deliberately?" Giles asked, stroking Ethan's shoulders gently.

There was a mumble that was possibly, "...be wonderful..." Giles smiled. It never failed to amaze him how he was seen by Ethan -- in Ethan's eyes, he was far better than he'd ever be in reality. He always had been, in one way or another. After a longish cuddle, Ethan pulled back. "I can't stand the stink of myself, dearheart. Come and get clean with me?"

"You just want me to make sure there's hot water," he teased, but willingly got up with Ethan.

"Can't say I'm all that enamoured with cold currently. If you hadn't rescued us yesterday, I'd be missing extremities currently." They headed into the bathroom, and Ethan got into the shower, but he waited for Giles to turn it on. As he had done every morning after their first one here.

Giles turned the dial, sending a small charge of magic through the pipes warming the water as it began to flow. "Yes, you never have explained how you and Ian ended soaked to the skin."

"Hit a root," Ethan said, moving under the spray and smiling happily as the water hit him.

"I'm still failing to see the connection," Giles replied, doing his best to keep his expression stern.

"The boat hit a root; we were rather close to the bank, you see. I did a quite spectacular dive."

Giles, knowing well Ethan's misadventures in the past, could picture such a dive. But that still left the question, "The boat?"

Ethan had filled his hands with showergel and now started to wash Giles, his hands slipping sensually over Giles' chest and arms. "The boat we borrowed."

This was certainly starting to sound like the kind of thing that had led to all sorts of excitement back when they were young. "Am I correct in assuming this was borrowing without permission?"

"The rope was fraying. We did the owners a favour really and drew attention to their non-existent security." Ethan's head was bowed as he rather distractingly lathered over Giles' belly and below, but Giles was fairly sure that despite the oh-so-reasonable tone, Ethan was smirking wickedly.

"You and Ian are bad influences on each other."

Ethan looked up, his expression more or less serious now. "We both needed some... lawlessness. All things considered, I think we were quite restrained."

"Funny," Giles said, remembering the rest of the night. "Restrained is not the word I would use."

Ethan's hands stilled. "Are you seriously pissed off?"

Giles shook his head. "I probably should be, but..."

"It was only a small boat, and we left it unharmed, just downstream a bit. I love you." Ethan wasn't even trying to be subtle in his cajoling, it seemed. His hands started moving again, turning Giles to wash his back. "And it was brilliant; you should have been there. We were controlling it with magic and going so damn fast and smoking as we did so. All that was missing was you being there."

"I think I'm glad to have passed on the midnight swim," Giles said wryly. "But the rest of the night, that I'm happy to have been included in."

"*That* wouldn't have ever happened without you, dearheart. Um, you do know that, don't you?" Ethan moved back around to look at Giles again, his expression uncertain.

"I do." Giles gave him a reassuring smile. "I've never worried about you and Ian that way. I'm just worried about you getting into other kinds of trouble. Like stealing a boat."

"Ian stole an oil tanker once," Ethan said with a cheeky grin.

"Please tell me you don't feel the need to top him."

Ethan giggled. "Oh, I'm a lousy top. You know that."

"I don't know -- you've certainly shown potential at times," Giles replied contemplatively. "But that wasn't what I meant. I'm not going to find you coming home with an aircraft carrier, am I?"

"Too samey," Ethan said, which was far from reassuring. "Are you going to let me do your hair?"

Giles turned back around to make it easier for Ethan to do so. "It was dangerous, what you did," he said softly.

"That was rather the point," Ethan replied, equally softly. "But there's no need to say the rest of it. I can hear it from my own conscience, which seems to be making up for all those years I kept it muzzled. I'll try not to take such risks in the future." He sounded sincere if rather glum about the prospect. Giles felt soapy fingers slip into his hair and start to massage.

Ethan was certainly relaxing him, but Giles couldn't quite let the subject at hand go without clarification. "It's not so much the boat ste-- borrowing as the operating of said boat while under the influence. You could have hit something far more dangerous than a root."

"Yes, I understood what you were objecting to." Ethan was starting to sound tetchy, although his touch remained gentle on Giles' scalp. "I can hardly berate you for taking risks with yourself when I'm doing the same and just for kicks. Message received and understood. Can we move on now?"

"Perhaps, when this," Giles made a vague gesture meaning the prophecy and all that came with it, "is all over, we can go joy riding some night in... something. Whatever we can find. And then drink and smoke when we get back home, just like we did last night."

Ethan waited until the shampoo was rinsed from Giles' hair before replying. "That would be nice... if *this* is ever going to be over, which sometimes I find myself doubting. But don't take any notice of me, Rupert. I'm grumbling for the sake of grumbling, I think. You know I'm happier now than I ever have been. Truly."

"I know." He smiled and turned back around to face Ethan. "Me too. I think what it might be this morning is that last night was like the best of the old days."

That won a warm smile from Ethan as he began to wash himself. "Yes, yes it was. Of course, back then we seemed to almost enjoy the morning after headaches, which I'm not finding so easy today. Although," he added thoughtfully, "it's not half as bad as it really should be. I wonder if Ian's horticultural enhancements include a pre-dose of hangover cure."

"It's possible," Giles said, batting Ethan's hands away and taking over washing him himself. "We should see if we can get some more, just to have on hand. For... emergencies."

Ethan chuckled. "He's still in there, isn't he? My Ripper. Does my heart good to see him occasionally." He seemed to see something in Giles' expression he didn't like. "Oh, don't. Don't look like that. You know I love everything of you, even the bits that get cross with me."

"It's all me, you know," Giles said, not for the first time. It had taken a long time to reconcile himself to what he'd spent too much of his life thinking of as almost a separate personality. "There's not one Rupert and one Ripper. It's all just me."

Ethan shrugged. "We all have sides, aspects. Myself included."

"I know." He leaned in to kiss Ethan briefly. "I've always known that about you. Even when you didn't."

Eyes shut as Giles washed his cock and balls, Ethan sighed contentedly. "Well then, doesn't the teenage rebel in you exalt to catch glimpses of the boundary pusher I was then?"

"I'd say the boundary pusher is alive and well," Giles replied with a smile. "You've just found new boundaries to push."

Ethan nodded, opening his eyes and becoming serious. "I'm going to push one now."

"Oh?"

There was another nod from Ethan and a wry expression. "It's been a week. Why haven't you gone back to your grandmother's chest? Doesn't it go against all good Watcherly instincts to ignore such a potential goldmine of pertinent information?"

"We've been utilising the Council resources," Giles said. "Going through them first." Not that he had much hope that Ethan would let it lie with that explanation.

"Yes, I know what you've been doing; that's not what I asked, is it?" Ethan sighed softly and pulled Giles to him; the water cascaded down Giles' back. "Talk to me?"

Giles closed his eyes, relishing Ethan's closeness. "I don't know what to say," he finally answered. He wasn't sure he understood his reluctance himself; putting it into words seemed beyond him.

"I think," Ethan said slowly, his voice so low he was almost whispering in Giles' ear, "that as well as a teenage rebel inside you, there is a little boy who loved his Gran very much."

He remembered her arms around him, her strong voice spinning tales both real and fantasy that held him captivated. "Yes," he murmured.

"She loved you too. Everything that she did was because she loved you and was scared for you. I don't believe there will be anything in that chest to disprove that."

Giles shook his head, but couldn't quite bring himself to deny Ethan's words. "I don't want to find out that she was a stranger. That the woman I knew didn't really exist."

There was a pause while nothing much happened bar the water falling and Ethan's hands moving soothingly over Giles' back. Then Ethan said, "Giles the Watcher, Rupert my husband, Ripper the handsome rebel you don't want to get on the wrong side of -- all you. Even if your Gran did have a side you never saw, that doesn't invalidate the aspects of her that you knew and loved."

That... made sense. It resonated with Giles in a way that shifted his whole perspective -- at least enough so that the thought of going up to the attic and opening the trunk stopped making his stomach clench. "When did you get so wise?" he murmured, turning his face into the crook of Ethan's neck.

"I'm not, not about most things. Just about you." Giles felt the side of his head being kissed and nuzzled.

This was what was new since Ethan had come back into his life, Giles thought again. Not only having someone to share everything with, but also someone who he could lean on, where he didn't always have to be strong and in control. He sighed and tightened his hold on Ethan.

It was a special moment, but eventually, Giles pulled reluctantly back and began to wash Ethan's hair before his spell ran out and the water turned cold.

As they finished their ablutions, and as they quickly dried themselves off, they were both silent, lost perhaps in the comfortable intimacy their communion had produced. The quiet continued as they took turns in front of the misted over mirror to shave. It was only as they were getting dressed that Ethan said, "Of course, it's all Xander's fault really."

Even as used as he was to following Ethan's strange tangents, Giles couldn't figure that one out. "I'm sorry...?"

Ethan paused in the act of pulling on his socks, perched on the edge of the bed. "Everything that happened last night. The blame for all of it can be laid firmly at the feet of Xander Harris, Watcher boy wonder."

Giles shook his head. "I don't..."

"Xander was the one I went drinking with, remember? It was meant to be just him and me. But he sodded off and left two old men helpless in the grip of wild impulse."

Giles stared at Ethan for a long moment. "That has got to be the most fantastic shifting of blame that I've ever heard."

"I'm serious!" Ethan claimed, looking anything but. "If Xander had stayed instead of going off to share germs with Kat, Ian and I wouldn't have gone boating. No boating would have meant no need to be rescued, and no car ride with our valiant knight protector would have meant no going up into your secret nursery. None of that would have happened if Xander had lived up to his responsibilities as a good mate."

"You really do have the most twisted mind I've ever encountered," Giles said admiringly, shaking his head.

"Thank you, dear." Ethan grinned. "You say the sweetest things."

***

"Christ, I'm starved," Ethan muttered beside Giles, as they walked into the kitchen together with their dogs, hoping for some very late breakfast.

"You're always starved," Giles teased, although he had to privately admit that he was feeling more than a bit peckish himself; the activities of the night before had used up a goodly amount of energy after all.

Mrs Bobbrick was busy kneading dough, but she looked up as the dogs scampered around her feet excitedly. "Into the scullery, both of you!" she scolded good-naturedly. "I have some nice bits and pieces left from Sunday's roast saved up, but only for *good* dogs."

Gwydion immediately wuffed in his increasingly deep voice and dipped his head to Mrs B. It was probably coincidence, but he almost seemed to be, well, bowing. He barked loudly at Skunk, who was still bouncing and yapping, and then the two of them scampered out to the scullery.

Mrs B shook her head. "Good thing I'm used to strange goings on with all my years working for your parents, Mr Giles. Now I suppose you two'll be after a stacked plate of elevenses, much like the other one."

The 'other one' -- Ian, no doubt. It looked like they were going to do the morning after encounter sooner than expected. Not that Giles was worried about there being any negative fallout, but you never could predict... All right, perhaps he was a *little* worried.

While he was busy not worrying about that, he answered Mrs. B, ordering breakfast for Ethan and him both, aware that his tone was polite, but a bit distracted.

She put the dough in a glass bowl and covered it with muslin. "Go and sit yourselves down in the dining room, boys. I'll feed your hounds then see to your needs."

"Thank you," Giles said automatically, heading back out of the kitchen, Ethan beside him.

Ethan's hand slipped into his, stopping him before he opened the dining room door. "It will be all right, dearheart."

"I know," Giles said, believing that, truly. "I just have a few too many years' practice anticipating problems, I think."

Ethan snorted very softly at that, smiling. "I think you can let your training go on this one." He kissed Giles' cheek and then, without letting go of Giles' hand, opened the door.

Ian was sitting alone at the head of large table, determinedly working his way through a truly monolithically proportioned breakfast. He glanced up at the sound of the door opening and smiled. "I was wondering when you two slugabeds were going to put in an appearance."

Ethan squeezed Giles' hand hard before letting go, and then made his way to a chair on one side of Ian, pulling it out with a flourish and sitting down. He immediately stole a piece of toast from Ian's plate, grinning in that disarming way that Giles knew so well. "Morning, my feathered friend. Mrs B said we're to share your brekkie. That's all right with you, isn't it?" He bit into the toast.

"You try that again and you'll be a three-legged fox," Ian shot back pleasantly, with an answering smile. "I'm sure the inestimable Mrs B would never deny hungry boys their much needed sustenance."

"You'd be correct," Giles confirmed, taking the chair opposite Ethan's, on Ian's other side. "Although we seem to rate somewhere below Gwydion and Skunk in priority."

"Yes, the mutts get roast beef, and we are forced to forage from other people's plates." Ethan was openly eyeing Ian's food, despite the warning.

"Perhaps they're better at being ingratiating than you are," Ian suggested, eating a rasher of bacon with obvious relish.

Ethan shrugged. "I can't say I'm at ease with the idea of servants, or whatever the PC phrase is these days. Live-in domestic workers?" Giles watched as Ethan's hand slid across the table towards Ian's plate, only to be stopped dead as Ian's hand came down like a stabbing beak and fixed Ethan's wrist to the table. Ethan looked unrepentant. "Mmm, masterful," he purred at Ian.

"Brat," Ian said fondly, still holding onto Ethan's wrist as he ate with the other hand. He turned to Giles. "Have you ever thought of using some kind of restraints?"

The question quite probably should have surprised Giles far more than it did. "We have, actually."

"Don't encourage him, Ian," Ethan said, but he sounded amused. "Rupert's rather too fond of misusing his magic in uncomfortable ways as it is. Uncomfortable for me, that is."

"Really." Ian looked intrigued.

"Let's just say that he sees no need for metal or leather where bands of magic will do and leave it that. I'm sure you can imagine the rest. Can I have my hand back?"

"Are you going to keep it out of my food?"

"You could just be the kind, warm, generous soul I know you to be and feed me." Ethan sighed heavily then winked over at Giles.

"You must have me confused with someone else," Ian told him. "I'm the old but charismatic and charming man that the two of you wore to a shadow of my normal self last night. I would think you'd show more concern for the results of your handiwork."

Ethan stuck his tongue out. "Never seen your patterns looking stronger."

The door opened at that point, and Giles couldn't help but smile as Ethan eagerly spun around on his chair, twisting uncomfortably as his hand was still trapped by Ian. But it wasn't Mrs B and the piled high breakfast plates Ethan had obviously been anticipating. Instead, Dawn came into the room, looking rather startled to see the three of them in there.

"Dawn?" Giles asked. "Were you looking for someone?"

The girl's eyes flickered towards Ian, but she answered Giles, "Um, you?"

"You seem to have been successful in your quest," Ian said, smiling at her. "We're having a bit of a slow start this morning. Would you like to join us for a late breakfast? I'm sure Ethan will happily share his food when it comes."

There was some kind of scuffle under the table at that, which led to Ethan and Ian staring at each other, eyes blazing with mock-affront. Dawn looked nervously at them both, and then turned her gaze to Giles. "Um, I had a dream." She didn't come any further into the room, and Giles could see now that she looked disturbed.

Giles pushed his chair back and held a hand out to her. "I take it that it was troubling?" he asked gently.

She nodded. Ethan and Ian had stopped their play fight and were looking at Dawn with concern. She came reluctantly over to the table and pulled a chair out a couple of places down from them. "I don't want any food."

"That's all right, my dear," Ian told her, his manner becoming gentler, more careful, although it was still casual enough to help put her at ease. "Eating with us is not mandatory. Would you like to talk about your dream?"

"Not really." Dawn looked glum. "But I think I should. It... well, there was stuff in it. Prophecy stuff."

"Such as?" Ethan asked, his tone soothing.

"Such as that symbol. The one that was on that bag, remember, Giles?"

The bag that seemed to carry the very essence of dark chaos; Giles wasn't about to forget that. "I remember," he told Dawn. "In what context did you see it? Was it on something or attached to a place or a person?"

"On a person." Her voice was small. "On me."

"You said when you first saw it, that it looked familiar. Perhaps your dreams are trying to tell you why." Giles glanced over at Ethan. "Perhaps you should tell her about the chaos theory of existence?" Ethan seemed to freeze in place and said not a word. "Ethan?" His lover gave him a pained look, but said nothing, not even through their mental link.

'She needs to know, love,' Giles sent. 'Especially since she seems to be the focus of it.'

He saw Ethan glance towards Ian. 'Later perhaps?'

'Is there some reason you don't want to talk in front of Ian?'

'I, er,' Ethan stared at the top of the table. 'I don't know actually. I am probably being idiotic. It's just... old loyalties... which I've already broken. Meaningless now. I don't know why I'm...'

"What's going on?" Dawn asked rather plaintively.

Ethan turned to her immediately. "I'm sorry. The silence is entirely my fault. Dawn," he took a deep breath, "some people believe that the universe, everything that exists, was created when a drop of primordial Chaos was introduced to the perfect order of nothing. Without Chaos, which brought with it time, change, and ultimately, life, nothing that we know would exist. Just eternal perfect nothingness. The... um, tool used to introduce Chaos to Order, and to keep the mix just right, was the Logos, what many religions would call the Word of God. The Logos still exists and can be used by those who know how either to increase the amount of Chaos in the universe -- breaking down the barriers between dimensions and distorting what we consider 'reality' -- or to turn the balance towards Order -- making for an increasingly limited, sterile existence."

She stared at him. "And you think that's me? You think the Logos... is the Key?"

He nodded once, his expression sympathetic.

"It's just an extension of what we already know about the Key's purpose," Giles put in, keeping his voice calm and logical. "Another telling of its -- your -- existence and importance."

She looked down. "In the dream, there was this door that I was trying to keep shut. Like I was leaning on it, but things, scary things were pushing through. And the Chaos symbol was on the back on my left hand, and another symbol was on my right hand." She looked up at Ethan. "Order, right?"

"Probably," he said. "Could you draw it?"

She nodded. "You both were there. You and Giles. You kept telling me that I had to let the door open, just this once. But I was scared because I knew there was a bad thing behind it. Like First Evil bad."

"In my experience, it always seems to be bad things behind doors in dreams," Ian put in. "There never seems to be happy things behind closed doors -- fluffy bunnies and the like. Almost enough to give one a phobia regarding opening doors."

"We found Giddy behind a shut door," Ethan pointed out, although what relevance that had, Giles wasn't sure. "Did we say why we wanted you to open it?"

Dawn shook her head. "Just that it was really, really important. But I didn't want to. I knew that if I did..." She looked around the table, suddenly defiant. "If I did, I would die. I tried to tell you, but you didn't seem to care. Not in the dream, anyway."

"Dawn." Giles leaned forward, holding her gaze seriously. "That won't ever happen. Anything we need you to do, we'll explain all we know. And I promise -- we care. We will always care about you, and will do all we can to keep you safe." He wanted to go further, and promise they wouldn't put her at risk, but somehow those words wouldn't come.

She smiled weakly at him. Ethan opened his mouth to say something, but the door opened again at that moment, and Mrs B came in carrying two stacked plates of breakfast, the dogs trotting behind her. "Hello dear," she said to Dawn as she put the plates on the table. "Are you feeling peckish too?"

"She can share mine," Ethan said, making a rude gesture behind his back to Ian that the women wouldn't be able to see, but Giles could. The dogs settled down on the floor, apparently sated for once.

Dawn looked at all the food with big eyes. "Um, maybe some toast?"

"Help yourself. Some of us know how to share." Ethan was asking for trouble, but at least it lightened the atmosphere.

"Good for you, m'boy," Ian declared heartily, clapping Ethan on the shoulder. "Never anything wrong with working on that moral fibre."

Ethan turned and winked at him, seeming more relaxed suddenly. "I just know I can steal any shortfall back from Rupert's plate." And he would too, Giles knew.

Putting aside thoughts about Dawn's disturbing dream, Giles concentrated on eating before his breakfast ended up joining Ethan's.

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