The Borders of Night Start to Give, Chapter 19/26

[punch_kicker15]

Title: The Borders of Night Start to Give
Author: punch_kicker15
Rating: R
Characters/Relationships: Willow/Giles
Summary: A prophecy leads Giles to practice dark magic once again. This sets him down a dark path, and Willow may be the only one who can help. AU in which Willow’s magic training started earlier than in canon.
Word count: 47,533
Notes: Thanks to scratchingpost1 for generously offering a plot bunny that ate my brain, gilescandy and dragonyphoenix for looking over a very rough first draft and offering helpful suggestions and encouragement. Thanks also to the mods (red_b_rackham and traycer_ and other participants at het_bigbang for all of the help and hand-holding throughout. And special thanks to angelus2hot for some amazing art she created for this story.

Chapter Nineteen

Hells Bells

Xander

Xander was on his way to tell Anya that he couldn't marry her, when Willow and Buffy cornered him just outside the Lodge.

Willow grabbed his arm, pulling him around to look at her. "Xander, that was a demon. He made up all that stuff about your future with Anya."

Xander sighed. "It doesn't matter if it was real. What matters is that it felt real. It felt like something that could happen if I married her."

"But marriage doesn't make you be awful to your wife. You've been living with Anya for a couple years, and you've been good to her. Why does the wedding change anything?"

He loved Willow, but sometimes he wished she hadn't been captain of the debate club. "I don't know. I haven't always been a great boyfriend to her. And why are you so gung-ho about this? You never liked Anya."

Buffy suddenly looked like she'd figured out a puzzle. "Xander, is this maybe about unresolved feelings for someone else?"

"What? No. There isn't anyone else. This is about my badness, and no one else's."

Buffy looked confused. "Then who's the guy that Willow slept with?"

What. The. Hell. He knew he'd been preoccupied with the wedding, but how did he miss that? "You slept with a guy? I thought you were trying to get back together with Tara. And you're gay! That means absolutely not sleeping with guys."

Willow sputtered, "It was one guy, not lots of--I don't--this isn't--stop trying to change the subject, Xander! I'm not the one who's getting married today."

Xander tugged on his bow tie, dreading what he had to do next. Calling off the wedding would be the worst thing he’d ever done. It would also be the only right thing to do for Anya's sake. “I can’t get married. I just can’t. I'm going to tell Anya, and then I'm getting out of Sunnydale for a while. I need some time to think.”

Buffy said, "If you're going to leave her, at least have the decency to stand up in front of the guests and tell them what's going on. Don't make Anya have to do that after you break her heart."

***

Anya

After Xander made his announcement, Anya slipped back to the dressing room and collapsed in a chair. She had a feeling that Hallie and D'Hoffryn would come by to say, "I told you so," about Xander and she couldn't bear to hear that at the moment.

Just half an hour ago, she'd been delighted with her beautiful dress, and how beautiful her bridesmaids looked in their dresses. She had been sure then that Xander had loved her and that this would be a perfect day. Now she wondered if she meant anything to him, or if she ever had. Did Xander lie when he told her he loved her? He'd lied when he'd told her he wanted to get married. If a man was willing to lie about one thing, it meant he was probably lying about other things. A thousand years of experience had taught her that.

Willow, Tara, Buffy, and Dawn surrounded her, repeating the same thing four different ways: they felt bad for her, and they were mad at Xander, but they were sure he felt bad too. Anya buried her face in her hands.

Then someone said, "Well, I see nothing's changed around here. You all still suck at being supportive. She doesn't need to hear how Xander feels about the whole thing. She needs to hear the truth. He was a coward to wait until the last minute to bring this up."

It was Cordelia. Anya had forgotten that she was here. She looked up at Cordelia, giving her a small, grateful smile.

The other girls gaped at Cordelia.

Cordelia came closer, hunched down so that she was at eye-level with Anya. "You know what might help? Take the money you were going to spend on the honeymoon and have a fun vacation for yourself."

Anya thought that sounded interesting, but, "I don't want to go on a vacation all by myself."

Cordelia said, "Why don't you come up to LA for a week or two? You can stay with me at Angel's. It's as safe as any place here, and you can save your money for shopping and clubs. Believe me, there is life after Xander Harris, and it's wonderful."

Willow said, "She's really good at helping people get over traumatic breakups."

Tara flinched and looked away from Willow.

Anya knew it sounded crazy. Spend a vacation with her ex-fiance's ex-girlfriend? Who was also Anya's last vengeance wish target? She could tell from the looks she was getting that everyone except Cordelia and Willow thought it was a crazy idea.

But what had she gotten from following human codes of behavior, from trying to fit in? Nothing but heartbreak.

Taking this trip sounded a lot better than moping around Sunnydale, where everyone was more Xander's friend than Anya's. Cordelia knew Xander, but wouldn't mince words about him.

"Ok," Anya said. "I just need a few minutes to change out of this dress."

***

Normal Again

Willow

Willow watched Buffy struggle against the magic barrier that kept her close to her bed. She hoped Spike and Xander would hurry up already with the demon. Dawn could be coming home from school at any minute. And Willow was feeling a little strange, like the walls of Buffy’s bedroom were pressing in on her, and she could suffocate at any minute.

She heard the door open downstairs, and yelled, "I've got her up here!"

"Willow?" Tara came up the stairs, and looked askance at Willow and Buffy.

Of course this must all look very strange to Tara. “She got stung by a demon, and she's wigging, big time. She thinks she's in an insane asylum and none of us are real. She tried to attack me in the kitchen. I'm keeping her behind the barrier so she can't hurt anybody."

Tara said, "Poor Buffy! And you look exhausted. Let me help."

Tara slipped her hand in Willow's, adding her magic to the barrier spell. Willow sat down on the floor, leaning back against the bedroom wall. She hadn't realized just how taxing the spell had been until Tara shouldered some of the burden. "Thanks," she said.

Tara said, "It's nothing."

Sometimes Tara's self-deprecation could be maddening. "It's not nothing."

It was weird how the little things she used to find so cute and endearing about Tara could be irritations now.

Just then, Spike and Xander arrived with the demon. Willow jumped up and grabbed the antidote recipe.

***

Tara

It had been four hours since Tara had coaxed Buffy into drinking the antidote, and Buffy was still talking to people who weren’t there, and ignoring people right in front of her. Maybe they should try some non-magical method of confining Buffy. But she hated the idea of chaining Buffy up like the demon who did this to her.

Willow crossed the room and peered at Buffy through the barrier. “It’s not working. I’m going to try telepathy to get through to her.”

“How long did the book say it would take?” Willow might get sucked into Buffy’s delusions. No sense in making things worse.

Willow bit her lower lip. “Three hours. We can’t leave her like this forever!”

Tara sighed and twisted the fringe of the bedspread between her fingers. “She’s gotten through worse on her own. Let's give her a little more time and trust her to find her own way back this time.”

To her surprise, Willow didn’t argue. She just paced and fidgeted and watched Buffy like a hawk.

About fifteen minutes later, Buffy stood up, turned towards one of the walls and said, “Thank you,” and then, “Goodbye.” Something about the tone of Buffy’s voice made Tara blink back tears.

Buffy’s eyes met Tara’s, and focused on her. “Where’s Dawn?”

“In her room. I’ll go get her,” Willow said.

Relief washed over Tara. Buffy had come through ok, and Willow didn't have to do anything super-scary.

Tara hugged Buffy. “I’m glad you got a chance to say goodbye.”

***

Giles

Giles fumbled with the door lock for his hotel room. He could hear the phone inside ringing, the echoes loud and strident in the empty hallway.

He opened the door and picked up the phone before it woke up everyone in the bloody hotel.

"Giles? Your cellphone has been sending me straight to voicemail all night. Why haven’t you answered it?” It was Willow, and his heart started to pound; the panic in her voice was contagious. What had happened while he was gone?

"I'm sorry, I turned my phone off during my flight this afternoon and forgot to turn it back on. What's happened?"

Willow said, "It's Buffy. She was stung by a demon that made her hallucinate-y and homicidal."

"Good Lord! Is everyone alright?" If someone had been hurt, and he'd missed a chance to help due to a careless mistake, he'd never forgive himself.

"Everyone's ok. We put up a magic barrier to keep her from hurting anyone, and then I made an antidote, and she seems back to normal.” After a moment, she added, “But maybe you should come back home and make sure."

Ah, yes. Willow and her belief that he was indispensable. It was endearing, even if obviously wrong in this case. He sat down at the desk, adjusted the phone under his ear. "It sounds like you handled it well. I don't think I would have done anything you didn't do."

She was quiet for so long that he thought they might have gotten disconnected, and then she said, "Maybe it's not about anything specific that you would do. Maybe it's about you making things better just by being here."

Her voice was so sweet and earnest, he couldn't help but smile. Then she said, "I guess what I should have said was 'I miss you', and that could have waited until tomorrow morning."

"Not at all." He opened his mouth to tell her that he appreciated the update on Buffy's condition. Instead, what came out was "I miss you, too."

Oh, dear. "A-All of you. I miss all of you." That sounded unconvincing to his ears, so he added, "How is everyone else?"

He listened as Willow told him that Xander had called off the wedding, that he and Anya had both left town temporarily, that Dawn had been shoplifting and Buffy was helping her make amends. He made sympathetic or distressed noises at the appropriate moments, not wanting to interrupt the flow of her words. He let the cadences of Willow’s voice wash over him. It was soothing, even when she was discussing everyone’s chaotic personal lives. It sounded like home. After weeks of travel and endless discussions with other Watchers, hearing about Sunnydale--even with its attendant crises--was a breath of fresh air.

All too soon, she said, "It's late and I don't want to keep you up. It was nice to talk to you."

It was only after they'd said their goodbyes, after he'd hung up the phone, after he’d gone to bed, that Giles realized that Willow had talked for a good half hour without mentioning Tara once. He wasn’t sure what to make of that.

Chapter 20