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BRAVE EYES	By : psimetis Category: -Buffy the Vampire Slayer > FemmeSlash - Female/Female > Tara/Willow Views: 6019 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 1
Disclaimer: I do not own Buffy the Vampire Slayer (BtVS), nor any of the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

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BRAVE EYES.Part4html

Title: BRAVE EYES

Author: psimetis

E-mail: psimetis@hotmail.com

Rating: NC-17

4/?

* * *

‘LIGHT’

“I-If Angel hadn’t been there, I would’ve...” Tara said quietly.

“God,” Amy simply ejected, her head in her hands as she stared wide eyed at her cup of chai tea. Both she and Tara were at the reading table of the Magic Box, and it was one of those rare nights where Tara would spend just a little time with her friends.

“Confronting her head-on is like such the bad idea,” the younger witch finally admonished Tara. “Which is probably why she did what she did, to, y’know, draw you out, make you start the fight so the blame rests with you. And if you did actually beat her up, you’d just look so bad, because she’s the Slayer. That’s why I keep saying, ‘sneaky witch’! Do the ‘sneaky witch’!”

“No cursing. No hexes,” Tara answered softly. She had barely touched her tea.

“A, ‘my will be done’ spell,” Andrew gave helpfully from the loft balcony, where he dangled his legs and read his comic books. Michael snorted from behind the store’s register.

“‘Harm none,’” Michael merely said. Michael was a very passive warlock, and besides Jenny, the most accepting of Tara’s commitment to peaceful Wicca practice.

“She said what she said as a message,” Tara murmured. “She knows that I don’t intend to keep Willow locked up in my dorm room forever.”

“Oh god, Tara,” Amy merely said again. If it were her, the Slayer would have been bald, blind, and terrorized by apparitions by now. Cursing wasn’t healthy for the witch doing the cursing, but it could be darn effective, and at least kept said witch and her vampire lover intact from Slayer fists.

Tara sighed and passed a hand wearily through her blonde hair. “I wish,” she said.

All three of the other occupants of the Magic Box stiffened in fright. There was a displacement of energy in the room, and suddenly a young, well dressed woman appeared, an orb of teleportation blinking briefly around her.

“Did you just forget that Anyanka the Vengeance Wish Demon owns the Magic Box, Tara?” Amy whispered out of the corner of her mouth. The blonde witch bit her bottom lip. Yes, she forgot.

Andrew remained as still as an invisible rabbit on the loft level, and Michael tried to look as passive and yet as busy as possible, behind the register.

“I’ll,” Amy started, as the well dressed, blonde woman approached their table. “I’ll--help Michael restock the herbs!” she suggested cheerfully, and immediately left the table.

Tara sighed as Anyanka slid into the chair beside her, the demon’s attitude attentive and politely sympathetic. Her amulet gleamed against her silk blouse.

“I’m not a scorned woman,” Tara told her.

“No,” Anyanka agreed, leaning ever slightly on her arm. She had a beautiful manicure, and very nice skin. She looked at Tara with interested, bright eyes. “But in all my eleven hundred years, I’ve never seen a case quite like yours. Love for a vampire, an enemy in the Slayer. I petitioned my overlord boss, D’Hoffryn, to take your case, and he agreed.”

Tara looked at the attractive demon with some disapproval.

“This would be a feather in your cap, I suppose, vengeance on a Slayer,” the witch merely said. She wasn’t really angry at Anyanka’s self-interest; she wasn’t even that offended. The other blonde was a demon, after all, and a very efficient one, or else she would not be eliciting the nervous fear that was coming off the others in the store.

“It would, but even more than that, it would be a satisfying, and very special, personal achievement,” the demon admitted. “But enough about me, let’s talk about you! The Slayer has done you grave harm,” she continued sympathetically.

“I don’t want vengeance,” Tara stated. Amy made a sound of derision from where she was helpfully loading a jar with more hellebore. Anyanka looked Amy’s way.

“You’d make a great vengeance demon, Amy,” she noted to the young witch.

“Thanks,” Amy acknowledged.

“I was angry. I’m still angry. But I have no intention of giving Buffy lasting harm,” Tara spoke, almost to herself, as she stared at the table before her.

“But your other options are undesirable. Do your friends know that you’ve been looking into transferring out of UC Sunnydale?” Anyanka put in. Amy and Michael, startled, looked at Tara from behind the counter. “Does your vampire know? You haven’t the money or resources to make such a move, yet. And if you are thinking about waiting the Slayer out, hoping she will lose interest or that, maybe, she might get herself killed soon--well, those are all ‘maybe’s’, aren’t they?”

Tara looked at the demon beside her, her blue eyes deeply sad and serious.

“Please leave,” she said.

Anyanka leaned in a little, gazing into Tara’s eyes.

“You are a good person, Tara Maclay. You would know how to handle the power of the Wish. I’m making an exception for you, because, as you say, you are not scorned. Since it is an exception, and a very special exception, don’t think of it as vengeance. Think of it as justice. Justice, for Willow.” Then Anyanka stood up, smoothing out her Anna Sui suit.

“I’ll be back to check the till later tonight, Michael!” she called out cheerfully, and she orbed out.

“Wish for pain. Like the pain of her victims. She should feel her victims’ pain, that sort of thing,” Amy immediately babbled.

“Guilt, lots of guilt. Torment, like Angel’s, for a hundred years,” Andrew exclaimed from the loft.

“If...if it’s for justice, perhaps it’s okay,” Michael said slowly. “And...you and Willow can get closure.”

Tara just sat silent, her arms crossed, as she stared at the black windows, which only reflected herself back at her.

“No,” she eventually said. “Retribution is never okay.”

* * *

Tara held a fresh strawberry between her fingers before Willow.

“Okay. Now I want you to,” she began. Suddenly the strawberry was gone, and Willow was chewing something.

“Will!!” Tara berated. “You weren’t supposed to eat it!”

“Oh. This isn’t naughty feeding?” Willow queried. She was seated cross legged before Tara, on the dorm room floor. Tara removed another strawberry from the plate beside her and held it before Willow again.

“No,” she informed. “This is a magic lesson.”

“Oh!” the vampire exclaimed, and immediately sat up straight.

Tara grinned at how she now had her vampire’s attention.

“When we work our will on something, we rely alot on ‘line of sight’,” the witch began. “But if we can already, um, discern where the thing is that we want to work our will on? Then visualization is good too.

“Learn this strawberry,” Tara then instructed.

“Okay,” Willow acknowledged. “But there are a couple of them over there too,” she added, pointing in the direction of the plate of strawberries, which she had easily scented. Tara set the one in her hand down before Willow, and moved the plate away to her desk table. She returned to sit before her vampire again.

“Okay. So did you learn your strawberry?”

“Yes,” Willow said cheekily, her tongue between her teeth.

Tara grinned again, then looked meaningfully at her lover. Though Willow could not see her eyes, the vampire could often sense when Tara focused on her.

“Now...work your will on it,” Tara instructed softly.

Willow concentrated, and reached with a different awareness for the small fragrant fruit she knew lay before her.

Tara watched as Willow mentally grasped the bright strawberry, floated it slowly up into the air like it were held in a cloud, then settled it softly down again.

The act was remarkably gentle, and was hardly awkward or forced at all.

“Beautiful,” Tara breathed.

And Willow smiled broadly, her blind eyes shining with pride.

* * *

Jenny watched the apple sail very slowly, very softly, straight up. It gave the slightest, elegant spin in the air, then floated gently back to the floor, with a grace the coven head was tempted to compare to that of a ballerina.

“Well done,” she finally praised, noticeably impressed by the display.

The rest of the coven members took that opportunity to clap appreciatively, and Willow beamed from where she sat on the floor.

“Very nice, very nice,” Jonathan was murmuring, stroking his chin.

“Beautiful, sweetie,” Tara congratulated, kneeling on the floor to give Willow a kiss.

“Anyone for soda?” Amy offered, already at the side table and pouring out a cup of coke from a two liter. The coven members broke up their viewing circle, eager for snacks.

It was evening, and they were congregating in Angel’s Crawford Street mansion. In return for erecting the ‘Slayer proofing’ wards around his property, he had graciously invited the coven to hold their meetings there.

“You have a very focused, attentive style,” Jenny was telling Willow. “It shows patience. Keep up that kind of concentration and you will have very successful spells.” Amazing, the teacher then thought to herself, that she can actually compliment a fledgling, baby vampire on a virtue like patience. Jenny recognized that the vampire’s ability to concentrate could easily be applied later to more difficult, ritualistic spells usually reserved for more disciplined witches like Tara and Amy. The coven head wasn’t about to tell a beginner like Willow that, however.

If the vampire was anything like the human Willow, she might refocus on over-achieving, and Jenny definitely did not want to encourage that.

“Reward, now,” Willow said happily.

“Uh,” Jenny said.

Tara fished in her sweater pocket and removed a red tootsie pop. Willow immediately grabbed it, the wrapper gone in a blink, and stuck the candy in her mouth. She scrambled to her feet and wandered away, barely avoiding furniture with a searching hand.

Jenny looked at Tara. Willow may have great concentration for a fledge, but her vampiric attention span was pretty typical.

“Reward program, huh?” she said to Tara with a raised eyebrow. The blonde girl blushed.

“It would be cool,” Andrew was saying eagerly over the chip dip to Jonathan, Michael, and a bored Amy. “She’s got real keen, magical perception. She could sniff out all those lost magical artifacts that are hiding here in Sunnydale. Or, if we need to track down Rack again, we can take her out--”

“On a leash, you mean,” Amy interrupted, in a really bored voice.

“Are you talking about me like I’m your Puppy?” Andrew heard a soft voice say casually behind him. Suddenly, all his friends beat a hasty retreat from the snack table, wisely scattering to other parts of the room.

“Wha, wha, um,” he gulped. He tried bravely to turn around. He drew on all his comic book fortified courage, and spun to face the vampire. He almost wished he hadn’t.

Willow didn’t dress like a scary vampire anymore, and being blind, she seemed tamed. But Willow was still Willow, Andrew realized belatedly. Still very scary--all pale, and wide eyed, and--very scary. Even with a lollypop in her mouth.

Willow pulled the candy out of her mouth, her blind, green eyes staring uncannily in his direction.

“I’m not your Puppy,” she stated very softly to the frightened, young man.

“N-N-No, you’re not,” Andrew stammered. “S-Sorry.”

“Bored now,” Willow whispered to him, standing very still with the candy in her hand. “Run, little boy.”

Andrew looked wildly around for Tara, and saw the blonde girl standing by Jenny, looking curiously in their direction.

“She’s just playing with you,” Tara reassured him. To Andrew, that sounded just like his mother’s tone when his bigger brother Tucker would chase him and then beat him up behind the house. What did moms know, he thought bitterly.

“Ah,” Andrew exclaimed as Willow stepped closer to him, and then he bolted for the verandah doors. Willow happily followed him outside.

“Tara said I could eat one of you!” she called out after Andrew in the garden.

“I did not,” Tara refuted in embarrassment to the room at large. Everyone returned to what they were doing, and Jenny turned to Tara once again.

“Are you still thinking about moving away?” Jenny asked quietly. Tara’s eyes immediately saddened.

“The more I think about it, th-the more it doesn’t feel right,” Tara finally answered softly. She fretted with the ends of her sweater. “It’s not just the money, and stuff. Angel said he’d help. It’s more about, taking care of the...threat. Of making sure that Willow has...nothing to fear anymore.”

Jenny took a breath, trying to remember that they were talking about Willow in particular, and not just any demon. Jenny was always of the mind that demons needed something to fear, hence the existence of the Slayer. Tara was far too compassionate for her own good. She was also, the teacher realized, a good soul seeking a non-violent solution, and that seemed hardly possible for the kind of tragic circumstance she and Willow had survived.

At least not possible in Jenny’s personal experience, or else she would tell Tara what that non-violent solution was, right now.

“With time,” Tara was saying to Jenny softly, as she stared away from her, caught in her own shadows of memory. “A person can come to understand things...that have happened to them. But vampires aren’t like that. For them, it’s kill and win, or, kill and survive. They don’t...”

“Bear the humility of mortal suffering,” Jenny finished for her, almost wryly. Tara’s blue eyes focused on her gratefully.

“Willow’s actually learning how. At least I think so. But it’s not enough. If she could have her eyesight now, she wouldn’t hesitate to try to kill the Slayer, somehow.

“If she regained her sight while we’re away, I don’t doubt that she’d leave me to come back for revenge,” Tara added simply.

Jenny shook her head, more to herself about the situation than to what Tara was explaining to her. “Is she thinking revenge now?” the teacher queried, wondering if, during all this time, Willow might have been plotting. Outside, Andrew’s cries of mortification were heard, and the other coven members gathered around the verandah doors to curiously watch his mysterious humiliations at the hands of Willow.

“I haven’t given her time to,” Tara gave quietly.

* * *

“More more more more more,” Willow was chanting softly, little breathy girl sounds from her lips as she crawled slowly and deliberately around the bed, all cat-like, pretending to look for Tara.

“Mmm,” Tara hummed, as Willow finally pounced on her, her vampire’s secondhand, baby tee riding up. She wore only that, looking delectable and naughty. The scars on her body from cross burns were only silvery ridges now.

“More what?” Tara murmured, as she ran lazy hands down Willow’s back beneath the little shirt. She squeezed the cool, firm flesh of her vampire’s ass. She wished she could buy Willow the kinds of clothes her vampire was comfortable with, but leather was expensive, and fetish gear was definitely not within Tara’s budget. Her lover didn’t seem to mind the thrift store clothing, though. Willow coquettishly pushed up the shrunken, faded girl tee she wore, revealing her small breasts. They gave a little bounce free from the fabric, the nipples hard and taut. She teased Tara’s face with the tips of them.

“More more more more Tara,” the vampire breathed above her, her clouded, green eyes shining. “More Tara everywhere. More Tara everything. More Tara always.”

“Beautiful baby,” Tara whispered.

“Inside,” Willow urged, and when Tara’s fingers found her vampire’s sex, it was very wet and ready.

Willow held the headboard and rode her witch’s hand slowly and deeply, making every wet, tight connection last.

“Love you,” she gasped, arching her pale, undulating body. “Love you love you love you...”

“Love you too,” Tara breathed, reaching, reaching beyond the internal scars, and spoke her declaration to Willow like a solemn vow.

* * *

When Willow came back, all she wanted was assurance--that Tara was really here, with her--that the vampire belonged here, with her--that the Slayer’s brutal lessons were not true--that she now had the chance to say what she had thought was irrevocably lost to her, in that cage--

“Love--you, love--you,” she gasped.

Not easy, cheap words of affection. Not lip services of gratitude to her savior. Not expressions of lusty, demonic obsession for her very beautiful, magical woman.

“Oh, Ta-ra, OH--”

Love. She was certain it was, because--how to explain such emotion? How to explain such indescribable beauty, agony, and joy that flourished in her like her own mini sun, just in Tara’s presence, and even without it. She loved her--

“OH TARA,” she cried, gripping wood beneath her hands and cumming, and cumming, and cumming--

REAL; her love became stark reality under the breaking of her bones. With the burning of her eyes, her inner sight had come alive and recognized Truth--not the truths the bitch had wanted to teach but the truth that had resided right there, all that time, in her undead heart--a truth she could have ignored if not for humiliation, a truth she could have lied about or mocked if not for being violated, over and over and over--

She collapsed upon Tara, a broken, spent thing; a vessel, a nothing, and then everything, all over again, but this time a Willow/void filled with only Tara/Love--

Love, you, she mouthed brokenly into the warm, living throat of her beloved. So much.

* * *

“Am I your Puppy?” Tara heard softly spoken up to her. She stirred from the semi-sleep and contented peace their coupling had brought her.

Puppy? the young woman thought, with the slightest frown, as she ran her hand languorously through Willow’s soft, bright hair. Tara was, unfortunately, always so slow of thought at times like this.

“Do,” Willow was saying softly from the pillow of her breasts. “Do you...think of me as your pet? Cos it’s okay, I don’t mind.”

Tara’s frown deepened, and she gently tried to lift her vampire’s face, wanting to look into her lover’s eyes. Then Tara realized: stupid, of course she doesn’t really know, it’s not like she can see your face.

“Come here, darling,” Tara coaxed, her heart hurting to see the guarded fear in Willow’s unseeing, cloudy eyes. Poor sweetheart.

She adjusted Willow atop her so that she could take her weight, and then placed her vampire’s slender, cool hands on her face.

“Doesn’t matter if you’re evil. Doesn’t matter what other people think,” she told her solemnly, as Willow felt her lips, her features. “I love you. I love you, Willow of Aurelius, childe of Xander, grandchilde of Darla. I love you, completely.” The smile that graced Tara’s mouth at the announced conviction was so wide with happiness, it felt like sunrise.

Understanding dawned on Willow’s face as her fingers felt that smile and the same joy grew and burst into being in her own wide eyed countenance. The vampire suddenly descended on Tara’s lips, kissing, kissing, kissing everywhere.

“Happy, happy,” Willow cried, as well as ‘love’, and ‘you’, and ‘thank you’. And she caressed her witch’s face over and over and felt the truth of Tara’s own declarations of love for her right there.

Much, much later that night, just a few hours before dawn, Willow was certain she was still glowing from her witch’s affirmations. As she made her very silent way down to the vending machines in order to ransack them for another orange juice carton for her witch, the vampire wondered if she was giving off love radiation, because that was exactly how she sappily felt; glowy and radiating of love.

“Love you lots,” she stated with happiness, as she beat up one of the machines until it dropped her juice prize for free.

Even love vibes, however, could not dull her other senses to the things that still existed out there, in the night.

On her way back up the stairs, she immediately clung to the stairwell’s wall and whimpered when she suddenly felt her.

“Go away,” Willow harshed out. “Go. Away.”

And when it didn’t, Willow tried to still her shaking fright and focus only on Tara, only on her eyes, only on her calm, beautiful, strong blue eyes--

“Not, not going to let you, take this, not,” Willow bravely got out, still feeling that presence right there, out--out there-- “Kill you first, I will. I will. I’ll kill you when I’m better. I Will!!”

And Willow ran as best as she could for her witch’s dorm room. During the hours until dawn, she laid tight in Tara’s arms, her love for her witch warring with demonic thoughts that submerged her in the familiar, dark scenarios of death and violence.

* * *

‘enlight’

“Evil,” Willow judged as she pulled a dark grimoire and then placed it on another shelf. “Evil,” she noted again with another book she pulled. She reshelved it. “Evil. Oh, and this one’s really evil!” She gave the sinister tome a slight sniff. It was giving off oily vibes and stank of hell and corruption. “Human skin. Blood of babies,” Willow assessed to herself. She wrinkled her nose. There was sick, the vampire thought to herself, and then there was sick.

“That one gets wrapped up for Angel,” Anyanka instructed from the store’s floor below. Willow was on the Magic Box’s second floor loft, where all the very serious magic books were stored. She was helping to sort through the ones Jenny didn’t want her coven members to even touch. Considering how full of nasty, black magic some of the off-limit books were, Willow could understand why. She would never want Tara touching these bad things. The vampire could hear the vengeance demon turn a page in the newspaper she was avidly reading, as the elder sat at one of the reading tables.

“Do you need more protective binding cloth?” Willow heard Michael helpfully call up to her, probably from his position behind the register.

“Nope,” Willow simply acknowledged. She carefully wrapped the ‘human skin’ book in a hide of more conventional leather, then secured it with braided leather lace--braided by herself, Willow noted proudly--and knotted the laces tightly. Then she placed the book for safekeeping in a chest meant for Angel--who was probably going to chuck it in the ocean or something. Willow had to wonder where elders hid stuff. If the Master had really hidden away some treasures, like Xander had said, Willow wouldn’t mind getting her little vampire hands on them so she could help her witch finally financially. She hated being a burden on her girl.

She takes care of me, she loves me, Willow thought happily. The vampire wanted to figure out what she could do to take care of Tara too.

“Where’s Tara?” she asked aloud, realizing her witch’s presence had disappeared.

“Below, in the basement stockroom,” she heard Jonathan say. He was somewhere below Willow herself, among the shelves that sold magic books to the public. “Andrew and Amy are still trying to locate the mummy’s hand that escaped. Tara went to help.”

Hrumph. Willow thought. I can hunt for a mummy’s hand, easily.

“Finish inventorying my evil books,” Anyanka directed from where she sat, like as if she’d read Willow’s thoughts. The vampire heard another page of the Italian newspaper--Il Manifesto, Anyanka had told her--being turned and the demon then chuckled to herself. It was obvious the elder was reading about some social or political disaster that she had personally caused.

Pah, Willow mentally scoffed. Don’t care. Want to see my witch.

Willow made her way to the loft’s stairs, easily ignoring her assigned duty. If she found the mummy’s hand for Tara, there was always the possibility of reward kisses.

She only made it two steps down when she felt it. The dreaded sensation took the strength from her legs and despite herself she sank, clutching to the bannister desperately.

Noooo, not now, she pleaded desperately, as she cowered on the step. Not now, when I still can’t see, not now!!

“J,” she tried, finding her voice suddenly gone. “Jonathan,” she called weakly. “G-Go get Tara.”

“Willow?” Jonathan called up to her. She heard the clueless, young man emerge from the stacks below, probably looking curiously up at her stupid, sick looking self. “What’s wrong?”

She’ll say nothing more. Not a word. Not if that bitch could overhear her right now, as she came closer, and closer. Willow could do this. She can tough it out. She was a vampire. Even if her legs didn’t work.

She tried to pry her fingers out of the bannister above her, wondering if she looked as pathetic as she had on that cage floor.

Anyanka leisurely turned another page of her newspaper, but she was no longer reading.

“She comes,” she merely said, and her tone held a quiet solemnity.

The Magic Box door bell jangled, and the door swung open.

Buffy walked in.

The other Slayer entered behind her.

The blonde Slayer stepped slowly down the steps, the hard soles of her steel toed boots impressing her weight deliberately upon the wood. She looked around casually, putting a finger out to idly poke some amulets hung on display. She came to a stop at the middle of the store, beside Anyanka’s table, and rested a palm on the surface as she looked down. The demon laid her paper aside, staring with interested, alert eyes. Buffy ignored her. She finally lifted her own emotionless eyes from her resting hand and directed them up the steps to the loft, and to the huddled figure there.

“Hey,” she said. “Happy to see me?”

Silence answered her.

Buffy turned with a brief motion of her head to address Faith.

“Should have heard her before. A really quip-meister. Guess she.” Buffy returned her cold attention to the vampire on the steps, her gaze wide and dispassionate. “Lost her smart mouth. A vampire, with no mouth, is like, not a vampire at all. So here I am. To put you out of your misery.”

“No,” Willow breathed. She wished for once, that her voice was not so little girlie and small. And shaking. “Thanks.....You, have no passion. You’re already dead. It would be, a, very sad fight. So,” she continued in a braver tone. “Let me put you out of your misery, instead.”

Faith guffawed briefly from her side of the room, but Buffy merely stared up at her prey and smiled.

“C’mon then, little Wills,” she quietly cajoled, remaining where she stood. “C’mon down then, and show Buffy what you’re made of.”

Willow gripped the bannister.

“C’mon, little blind bat,” Buffy quietly taunted, staring wide eyed at the seated vampire.

“Back off,” Jonathan suddenly blustered, from below Willow. Buffy’s eyes connected with his.

“Unless you really got the stones,” she stated with deadly intent. “You don’t get a second warning.”

Jonathan clenched his fists, his rapid thoughts evident on his face, and Buffy stared, fascinated.

“Jonathan, don’t,” Willow suddenly ordered him from above. Slowly, the vampire rose to her feet. “I’m coming down,” she said.

Buffy’s gaze slid up to her prey.

“Leave Jonathan alone,” Willow warned, as she took a step.

“Sure,” Buffy said. She watched Willow take another step. “Guess I didn’t hit you enough,” she added.

Willow took another step.

“Oh,” Buffy remarked casually. She reached for the small of her back, and pulled out something. There was the familiar clink of metal upon metal.

Buffy held the cuffs aloft. “Brought your favorite bracelets.”

Willow swayed on the steps, clutching the bannister. The naked fear in her blind eyes was everything Buffy wanted to see.

“Ignite,” a woman’s voice intoned from the basement door.

The cuffs flared red hot in Buffy’s hand, forcing the Slayer to drop them.

“Ow,” Buffy merely said.

Tara stepped forward, placing herself before the blonde Slayer. Amy, Andrew, and Jonathan spread themselves quickly behind her. Faith, from her position behind the watching Anyanka, went into a defensive stance.

“B’,” she warned.

Buffy just held up a hand in the direction of the dark haired Slayer, then dropped it. She stared up into Tara’s eyes.

“’Bout time,” she simply said.

“Amy, take Faith,” Tara ordered, her gaze unwavering. Amy’s eyes turned to black.

“Thicken, Hold Fast,” she intoned, staring at Faith. The dark haired Slayer found herself immobile.

“B’!” she cried. “Get out of here! B’!!”

Buffy ignored her, her eyes only on Tara’s.

“Tara?” Willow whispered from the stairs, trying to discern what was going on below her.

“In a minute, baby,” Tara reassured, never taking her eyes off Buffy.

“Why are you still here,” the Slayer mused, as if to herself.

“I couldn’t leave town,” Tara quietly said. “I have to finish what you’ve started.”

Anyanka rose from her seat.

“You’re ready,” the demon ascertained, anticipation gleaming in her eyes like a coach appraising her champion. Tara finally looked away from the Slayer to grace Anyanka with a quiet look, then turned to the loft stairs.

“Willow,” she urged. “Come down, baby.” She held out her arms, as Willow obeyed, stepping down until she found the safety and warmth of her witch.

“What’s going on?” the vampire whispered, as she hugged Tara close.

“I’m going to make a wish,” Tara told her softly. “I’m going to do it for us. I just...I hope you’ll understand why I’m doing it,” she added with trepidation and worry, as she caressed Willow’s dear face.

“I trust you,” Willow said, as her shining, blind eyes found Tara’s.

“But--”

“I trust you,” Willow reiterated softly, and a small smile reassuringly curved her lips for her witch.

Tara kissed her sweetly, and when she turned back to the watching Slayer, there was a barren landscape in the smaller girl’s eyes.

A devastation.

“B’!!” Faith shouted.

“Do your worse,” the Slayer simply said.

Tara held Willow’s hand.

“I wish that Buffy Summers should know, in an instant, all that Willow, childe of Xander, knows, and has known,” Tara spoke quietly.

“Done,” Anyanka granted, and she wore her demon face.

Buffy immediately collapsed.

She began convulsing, her eyes agonized and unseeing. She shook from being the forced vessel of another’s life and unlife. Recognition, horror, and revulsion twisted her comprehending face. She opened her mouth.

A deep, guttural howl of anguish tore from her being.

She kept howling.

“S-Stop,” Andrew cried, palms to his ears. “God, make her stop!!”

Finally, the Slayer’s screams stopped.

She stumbled to her feet, blind, flailing.

She made it to the door.

She fled wildly into the night.

“Release,” Amy bemusedly said, and Faith immediately ran out of the store after the other Slayer.

In the stillness of the store, Anyanka walked back to the table she had left her newspaper at, her expensive heels making a leisurely, rhythmic sound that broke the silence. She picked up her newspaper, folded it, and then walked back to where Tara stood, her vampire wrapped around her. Willow was kissing the tears away from the young woman’s face.

“Well done,” Anyanka said, a sense of great, personal satisfaction in her voice. She spared Tara a thoughtful glance, then reached out and very briefly, and awkwardly, patted the witch’s arm. Then she orbed out.

“It’s over,” Andrew blurted shakily, utter relief and a grin forming on his face. “It’s really over!”

No one said anything. Willow buried her face in Tara’s neck.

After a while, she murmured softly into her witch.

“Liked her screams,” she said.

* * *

BRAVEEYES.Part5html

Title: BRAVE EYES

Author: psimetis

E-mail: psimetis@hotmail.com

Rating: NC-17

5/?

Sober Warning: Stomping.

* * *

‘SHINE’

On the bus ride back to campus, Willow sat snug against Tara in the front, side seats reserved for the elderly and handicapped. Tara tried to ignore the female senior citizen across from them, who stared balefully and didn’t seem ready to release the two from her stern, unfriendly gaze anytime soon. It could be, Tara mused rather distractedly, that the woman was displeased that two seemingly well abled girls were sitting in the handicapped section. Or, Tara further rationalized, the woman was not liking how Willow was nuzzling Tara’s neck in what was obviously an intimate manner. Or, Tara finally thought, the old lady was just a bitch who somehow knew exactly what the blonde witch had done to the Slayer back at the Magic Box.

Andrew had been absolutely giddy, thinking Tara had won a victory over the villain Slayer. Tara let the young man have his moment of joyous relief. They would all find out, soon enough, how much damage Tara’s decision had done.

“This means,” Willow was whispering very softly beside her, with her head resting in the crook of Tara’s neck. “She knows about how I married Xander when we were five.”

Tara smiled briefly, feeling pained. She wondered again, what the human Willow had been like.

“This means,” Willow continued softly. “She knows my fears.”

The cool hands wrapped around Tara’s tightened.

“This means, she knows how much I love you,” Willow suddenly snarled, her grip suddenly unbearable.

“Will, Will--” Tara gasped, knowing she won’t be able to extricate her hand.

The vampire’s fingers immediately softened, but she sat up then, her blind eyes wide and unseeing. She realized that the Slayer now had everything of hers, even those precious memories the vampire would rather take a stake to the chest over than have that bitch touch. Everything Willow knew. Everything Willow knows.

“I’m sorry,” she heard her witch tearfully say beside her. “I’m sorry.”

Willow reached for Tara’s face, and kissed away the tears.

“It’s okay,” she whispered against the warm cheeks, thinking as she cradled her witch’s face. “I’ll kill her. I’ll kill her, and then it will be all okay.”

While kissing Tara--and feeling the uneasy, cold vibe of another, watching them--Willow felt a semblance of her old, demonic self return; one that looked forward to murder.

* * *

Word got around quickly in Sunnydale that something was not quite right with the ‘Fascist’ Slayer. There were strange stories of the Slayer, apparently in a state of madness, seeking out certain demons and tearfully making confessions to them. The newer Slayer captured the old one and that one hadn’t been seen since. Alot of demons wondered what kind of whammy had been placed on the blonde Slayer to fuck her up so, because it was apparently a really good one. Anyanka, busy in Moscow, knew she had all the time in the world to finally let the Sunnydale denizens in on what had really happened, and which vengeance demon should be congratulated for the deed. So she continued with the case she was assigned with, and the gossip flew.

“She, uh,” Clement, the benign, loose skinned demon shrugged. The other demons at poker leaned in to hear how his surprise visit from the Slayer had turned out. “Was saying sorry about...killing my cousin for no reason, y’know? But she’s the Slayer, so...” the demon just shrugged again.

Willow heard these things at Puppy’s mansion as refugee demons finally left his safe haven and returned to their homes. She smiled quietly at the stories, but never volunteered the true tale. Instead, whenever she could track down Puppy during her mansion visits, she’d ask him to spar.

Willow became more and more fierce during their fight matches, and Angel realized that for the Little One, it was no longer about play.

And Tara watched from the mansion’s verandah doors as her vampire and Angel would fight, with great unease in her heart.

* * *

Jenny set her bulging teacher’s briefcase and her keys down with a heavy sigh, then tossed herself into her nearest chair. Before she could get too comfortable however, she gamely forced herself out of the chair to retrieve a cup of instant noodles and prepare hot water for it.

Rupert had looked as bad again at school as he had when he first confessed about Willow’s imprisonment to Jenny. She still wasn’t speaking to him, because of his complicity in that horrible event, but she was also of half a mind to just forgive him so she could finally find out what was exactly going on with his Slayer.

A witch didn’t have to be a rocket scientist to understand the significance of what Tara had done to Buffy, but it would help to know how the young woman really was, currently.

Jenny rather regretted that Tara hadn’t consulted her before making her wish, but then, from what Amy had told her, the volatile confrontation at the Magic Box had rapidly approached ‘suicide by coven’, at least on Buffy’s part. Faith, Jenny didn’t doubt, would have done her best to survive a fight with her witches. Tara had, by quickly incapacitating the blonde Slayer, managed to save her coven from possible losses and also from possible retaliation from the Watchers’ Council.

So what does this mean now? The teacher asked herself as she poured the hot water into her noodles’ styrofoam cup and then tapped the top of it distractedly with her plastic fork. She knew something was not finished about this situation, and obviously the name of that ‘something’ was spelled ‘Willow’.

Revenge, Tara had said. If Jenny were a vampire, she knew what she would do. Even Amy, who could be as vindictive as her mother, was looking serenely justified right now, after the Magic Box incident, but that was because she was human. Vampires were not that easily placated. Buffy’s fall into possible, temporary madness would just be considered a first step--one that would lead into a game played until it finally ended in the victim’s, or in this case, foe’s death. Jenny wondered how Tara, who could be too soft and compassionate at times, might be dealing with this inevitable focus of her vampire’s.

Jenny tapped her fork impatiently again. Unlike Rupert, she wasn’t about to fail one of her young charges. As Amy would say, Jenny will have to pull an ‘alpha witch’, but if it kept everyone alive, then that was what she’ll do.

* * *

“Willow, it’s Jenny,” the teacher said at Tara’s closed dorm door. It was evening, and she had called ahead, to make sure the young vampire was in. Tara was still away in classes.

The vampire opened the door slowly for the coven head, a rather languid, deadly attitude in her casual stance. Willow stared with lidded, blind eyes. Yes, Jenny thought to herself. Looks like the little vampire was getting it together again.

“Tara’s still out, I see,” Jenny said unnecessarily, as she stepped into the room. She moved to take a seat at the desk chair without waiting for an invite--not that she expected one from Willow. The vampire closed the door, turned to face the coven head, and stood relaxed and yet very still, as if assessing Jenny’s presence.

“Whatcha want, Jenny?” the vampire finally asked point blank, but in a sweet manner that seemed polite, when it sounded just a touch more like menace.

“Let’s talk about your wanting to kill Buffy,” Jenny suggested, to the vampire’s surprise. “Come sit over here, Willow,” she then ordered. She was taking a big chance, trying to assert authority over the vampire, but if she guessed correctly about Willow and Tara’s relationship, Jenny could be seen as an ‘elder’ in the fledge’s current relationship dynamics, and the teacher wanted to work that to her favor.

Willow scowled from where she stood and didn’t move. All right, Jenny thought. We’re getting a little resistance from the fledgling here. I can work with that.

“It’s none of your business what I’ll do to the Slayer,” the vampire growled.

“It is when it affects my witches, and you are living with one of them,” Jenny pointed out. “If you actually killed Buffy, what do you think Faith would do?”

“I’d kill her too.”

“And the Slayer after that?”

“Her as well,” Willow hissed.

“Then you’d really be on the Watchers’ hit list,” Jenny remarked. “And so would Tara.”

Jenny had met some really arrogant vampires in her time. Their dedication to selfishness and their single-mindedness for their own concerns were often not worth trying to dissuade, but better ended with a nice, pointy stake. Jenny was counting on Willow however, being so young and having proven herself just a little different by her dedication to Tara, to not be as stupid.

Willow’s scowl receded to a look of angered realization, and some unhappiness.

“Come sit over here, Willow,” Jenny offered again.

Willow moved, but not in Jenny’s direction. She reached out and touched the walls of the room, and especially to brush her hands over her witch’s hanging Christmas lights.

“I want that bitch’s heart,” she said finally, her tone fierce.

“I can understand,” Jenny acknowledged. “And if it were just you, I actually wouldn’t mind standing back and letting you two go at it, but there’s Tara to consider now too.”

“I could go cripple her. I could go take her eyeballs like I want,” Willow stated, fingering her witch’s lights.

“You could,” Jenny agreed. “And if you could be satisfied with just that, maybe that’s good. But I don’t know if bringing those eyeballs home would agree with Tara, much less Faith.”

Willow suddenly stamped her foot.

“Did she send you?!” Willow lashed out. “Did Tara send you to see me??”

“No,” Jenny ejected, surprised. “No,” she added with more firmness, utilizing her authoritative ‘teacher’ voice. “Tara doesn’t know about this conversation. I came on my own, because I realized what you might be thinking. I’m trying to watch out for the both of you.”

A vampire, if it paid attention, could sense the true emotional intent of a human; if the human were lying, for instance. All manner of physical data, such as scent, temperature, and rate of pulse could inform the vampire, who knew what to look for, of a human’s true intentions. Jenny was not trying to manipulate her, Willow realized. She sensed such solidity from the teacher; a state of concern and conviction. Before Tara, Willow had never had someone care enough about her. Even when she was human, all she had was Xander. Though she was angry and feeling quite resentful of the coven head’s sincere concern, a little bit of her demon self reluctantly respected it.

“Still want pieces of her,” Willow whispered, as her hands traced the patterns of the Christmas lights.

Jenny merely watched her and said nothing. Rome wasn’t built in a day.

* * *

When Tara came home, she found Willow smoothing down the bedspread with almost meditative slowness. She was also very quiet, and Tara, after her initial greeting, realized that perhaps Willow needed some silence for a while. The young woman turned to her mini fridge and quietly began to make a sandwich for herself.

“You’ve been upset, but I thought it was about midterms,” she heard her vampire softly say. “You’re really upset because you don’t want me to kill the Slayer.”

Tara paused in spreading the peanut butter on her bread.

“I--I,” she began, then swallowed.

“You didn’t say anything. Were you ever going to tell me?” Willow continued, in a soft, even tone. When Tara glanced at her, she saw the vampire was still smoothing down the coverlet. The surface was perfect.

“Yes,” Tara admitted. “I just d-didn’t know h-how to say it without.” She swallowed again, trying to still her stammering. “W-Without influencing you,” she finished hesitantly.

“What do you mean?” Willow harshed out, finally raising her unseeing, green eyes to Tara. “All you have to do is say you don’t want me to kill her, and maybe I won’t do it!”

“I-I know, I just,” Tara attempted, and then paused again. She rose to her feet to face Willow. She was never, ever good with words. An unforgiving family had seen to that. “I just don’t want to be that for you. Th-The one you change for. You have to do this for yourself,” she finished with conviction.

Willow just stared blindly, lack of comprehension and a fair amount of impatience in her slender face.

“You,” Tara said, as she gazed into Willow’s unseeing eyes. “Are so special. I’ve grown because of you. I’m stronger. If something ha-happened to you, I still want to be this person. I don’t want it to go away if, if you went away. Do you know what I mean?” she asked hopefully. “If you do these incredible things you do, just for me? I don’t want to take this...‘special’ you, with me. If. If I went away. You should have your chance to keep it.”

Willow stood silent, trying to understand what her witch was saying to her. Finally, she spoke.

“You’re my angel Tara, who sits on my shoulder, and sometimes I listen to you. There is no angel Willow here.” the vampire said. “Just me, the demon.”

“A special demon,” Tara whispered.

“If you say so,” Willow answered, with a frown.

Tara knelt by her mini fridge again, and put her sandwich away.

“Are you hungry?” she asked, trying to reign in her emotions.

“Yes,” she heard Willow softly say.

“I’ll, I’ll take you out then, and...we’ll find you something. To eat.”

* * *

Tara took her out hunting now, with the bitch Slayer now missing.

This was something Willow could do; it was familiar, it was natural instinct. She didn’t want to think about being ‘Special Willow’, this strange, moral?? creature her witch somehow expected her to be. She would just fail her girl in that case; she still wanted to kill the Slayer. Therefore, she was very glad her witch took her out hunting. It was affirmation from her lover. It meant that Tara accepted what would make Willow strong. She truly felt free to be a vampire then, doing what she did best, luring prey with her innocent, blind girl act, and then safely putting the bite on her victims as her witch quietly watched her back. She never drained her prey, of course. She didn’t drain them because of her Tara. Maybe her witch was right, and she would go back to being Bad Willow if something should happen to....but that was not going to happen. Nothing was going to happen to her witch. But the option of someday becoming Bad Willow again? That option wasn’t so bad. It was a thought that would definitely give her warm fuzzies at night.

Willow lapped at the oozing bite marks she had made on the unconscious female student in her arms. They were in a computer lab, and she had snuck up on the girl rather than played with her; sometimes it was best to just put the bite on people rather than leave behind victims who could identify her around campus later. Willow finally laid the girl down, with head resting on crossed arms before the humming computer monitor, and then focused on the steady heartbeat of her witch. She found her near the lab entrance, and immediately curled up against Tara.

“Happy now,” she purred, literally doing just that, deep in her slender chest as she rubbed against Tara. After a kill, she always had sex with Xander. The first three weeks she had been with Tara had been the same.

“Do you watch me?” she breathed into her witch’s neck. “Do you watch me when I feed?”

“Sometimes,” Tara whispered briefly back. There was a tenseness in her soft, strong body, and the redhead knew it was because her witch still found it unsettling, allowing the vampire to feed freely on people while Tara protected her. Willow ran her lips up the blonde’s warm throat and sought her mouth. She found something sweet and minty being pressed between her amorous lips instead.

“I do not have blood breath,” Willow protested with a slight pout, as she sucked on the peppermint.

“Yes you do,” her witch merely countered. “And it’s gross. C’mon,” she then added, taking Willow’s cool hand in hers. “Let’s go home.”

* * *

Giles realized he had been drinking alot lately, but somehow, he didn’t give a damn.

Buffy was sobbing loudly in the bathtub again, her chains clanking. Giles regretted having to restrain his Slayer there, but it was the only safe place for a super strong, distraught young girl at the moment. Buffy’s words of anguish were disjointed, choppy--their significance only meaningful to her, as if she were having a fragmented conversation with apparitions. Giles had already given up on trying to understand her words. Any attempt to offer some form of coherent, comforting response would probably not be understood, at this point.

“Fuck,” Faith said, frowning hard into her take away aluminum of lasagna. She stabbed at her meal viciously--a meal portion that looked large enough for four. Giles knew his second Slayer could easily devour the tray all by herself. He had given her twenty dollars to find something to eat, and she had returned with an interesting choice of dinner. What was it the Americans called such meals? Giles mentally realized. ‘Comfort food’. Faith had tried to coax Buffy into eating some, but it had ended up on the ceiling of his bathroom instead.

Buffy gibbered tearfully to her invisible demons in the bathtub.

And Giles wished it were that simple to explain--that his Slayer was suffering because of the presence of actual, tormenting imps. But Faith had managed to recite back to him what Tara had wished for, and there was nothing in that wish that would be so appropriately vindictive, much less malicious. Tara had only wished that Buffy should know what Willow knew. It was practically a benign vengeance. Such knowledge received could be shocking, frightening, and revolting, but Buffy, he knew, had gone through worse, had seen worse, and, much to his regret, done worse. Guilt and shame might be what his Slayer was burdened with right now, but it didn’t explain her current, seeming madness.

Giles poured himself another shot of scotch, and swallowed it pensively. Buffy, as far as he knew, was a girl of iron will and iron control. She believed and did things only a certain way, and the world was bent to fit her Slayer vision. Something about Willow had broken through those iron walls of righteousness, shattered the Great Slayer and left, in his bathroom, a girl completely exposed, raw, and undone.

“Fuck! FUCK!!” Faith swore again, flinging her fork into her meal as Buffy wailed again. Giles had set up wards of silence around the bath, but apparently Faith’s Slayer hearing could still detect Buffy’s outbursts of emotional pain. His second Slayer took to her feet, and grabbed her jacket.

“Going patrolling,” was all she tersely said, and left his apartment.

* * *

Willow loved being out in the night again.

She loved the air, the energy, the subtle sounds, and she especially loved roaming along the winding, campus trails with her witch. Tara wouldn’t let her leave her side though. Even if the vampire were capable of walking on her own, Tara was fearful of the dangers of the night.

“Could the Slayers somehow hurt you? From afar?” Tara had asked her before their first hunt together.

“Yes, crossbows,” Willow had answered simply. So Tara kept her arm firmly wrapped around her, intending to shield her with her body. Willow liked the snuggling, despite being thus tethered. Her witch was so warm.

“This is our third hunt together,” Willow said happily. She couldn’t believe that they had done this for the third time this week. She was so glad Tara had taken care of the bitch Slayer.

“Yes. I’m thinking a change of scenery though, before, um, you become noticeable. Would a night at a club be okay with you?”

“Dancing,” Willow enthused, hugging her witch closer as they walked.

“Oh, I-I’m not much of a fast dancer,” Tara admitted.

“All slow dances. With Tara-kisses,” Willow rejoined, stopping their bodies for a moment. She circled Tara’s waist and led her into a slow, easy circle, her witch’s arms automatically embracing her neck.

“Slow is nice,” she heard Tara admit to her, a smile in her voice, and then the vampire tickled her witch, getting a beautiful giggle.

She felt a familiar tingle up her spine.

Willow whirled around, pressing Tara to her back. She broke into her demon visage and growled menacingly into the darkness.

“What is it?” Tara whispered quickly, her arm coming around to protect Willow’s chest.

“Slayer,” Willow snarled. Tara immediately looked around. Not for the Slayer, but for the nearest shelter they could run to. A science building was nearby, a good hundred yards away. She could magic the lock. She didn’t want Willow out in the open.

When she swung her head back to tell Willow this, she saw it was already too late. The dark haired Slayer was running towards them.

“Stay BACK,” Tara commanded, not with magic, but with a sudden authority that lent her quiet figure power as she stepped quickly around Willow to shield her. She heard Willow growl in protest at being shoved behind, and felt her push to switch, but Tara held firm. The Slayer came up short, standing a few feet away with hands raised, breathing hard.

“Just wanna talk, Tinkerbell,” Faith offered. She made a gesture to Willow, snarling warningly behind Tara. “Keep your Fang muzzled, and we’re cool.”

Tara stared at the Slayer, assessing her.

“Will,” Tara finally said, firmness in her tone. “Faith doesn’t want to fight.” She didn’t exactly feel Willow standing down behind her, especially with the sub vocal growl emanating from her vampire, but she didn’t exactly want to spend all night talking to Faith either.

“Okay, so what is it?” she asked the Slayer pointedly.

“Look,” Faith began. “It’s been a week, and B’s learned her lesson, okay? No more being Terminator Slayer, her head is totally fucked with now. So lift your curse or whatever, okay?!”

Tara frowned. “It’s not a curse, just a wish, and...I don’t think even Anyanka can reverse it. I only wished for Buffy to have knowledge, that’s all.”

“Well it’s really fucking with her head, Tink!” Faith exclaimed, stabbing a finger at her own head in emphasis. “She’s--she’s just like she was in the Magic Box, still freaked out! And it’s been a week!”

“Oh boo hoo,” Willow sneered from behind Tara.

“Shut your mouth, vamp,” Faith warned, taking a step forward.

“Faith,” Tara said warningly. “Another step and this conversation is over.” At this, the Slayer turned to Tara with pleading eyes.

“Fix this,” she asked, her brown eyes wide and beseeching.

“I can’t,” Tara admitted with sadness, feeling Faith’s pain. “Nor can Anyanka. I only gave her knowledge. It’s up to Buffy how she deals with it, and if she’s suffering because of it, that’s.” Tara looked meaningfully at Faith, hoping the dark haired Slayer understood. “That’s really up to her.”

Faith let out a cry of frustration, stomping the grass beneath her.

“Why didn’t you just wish it didn’t happen?!” she accused. “Why didn’t you wish they never met, or--”

“You don’t play with things like the events of time!” Tara snapped. “What’s done is done. Now there’s just after. And that’s what we have to deal with.

“These things happen,” she finally added, looking at Faith with the sadness she held in her heart. “You...you can only be there for her now.”

Faith stared at her, disbelief, anger, and disappointment raging in her features. She finally raised both hands and flung them in a dismissive gesture at Tara.

“Fuck this,” she simply said, and turned to run quickly into the night.

“Fuck you,” Willow imparted cutely, though the Slayer was already swallowed into the dark as she ran off. Keyed up by the confrontation--and by her butch-Tara--Willow playfully bit with blunt teeth into her witch’s shoulder.

She giggled.

Tara didn’t take Willow hunting for the next few nights. She was worried about Faith, wondering if the dark haired Slayer’s frustrations with Buffy’s suffering might eventually be redirected at Willow instead. Willow understood the wisdom of being kept in, but she didn’t have to like it.

So she preoccupied herself with that very unvampire thing Tara had just taught her; she knitted instead.

* * *

When Buffy slept, she dreamt of a lonely childhood spent with a wonderful, infuriating, dark haired boy whom she had the utmost love, trust, and eventual longing for.

She dreamt of books, and science, and math, and of report cards with letters proudly accumulated like girl scout badges.

She dreamt of a first crush, of a first kiss, and then of a seduction and of a painful, scary death.

She dreamt of blood and more death, but these were things she was familiar with.

What was not familiar was the love that eventually flared within; new, incredible, encompassing, like a mini sun.

Buffy dreamt of a woman’s cherished, warm embrace, and the press of her soft body, and the press of her soft lips, and the coursing, singing flow of her magic, giving a world electrified and reborn to her.

Buffy would awaken, but the dreaming memories were not the memories that drove her mad. When she was awake, she remembered exactly those memories that hurt her most, and she did not want those memories. It killed her. She remembered experiencing another reality, some alternate place, where ‘another-she’ existed and ‘another-like the vampire’ existed, except this another was the girl, not the vampire.

And they were friends.

She remembered seeing the utter devotion in her double’s eyes, for her dear friend.

She saw how her other self protected her.

Buffy wailed in anguish in her Watcher’s bathtub.

This was the knowledge that killed her.

* * *

“Hm hm hmmm,” Willow hummed softly, as her knitting needles clicked rhythmically together.

Funny, the last time she hummed happily was when she was lighting matches and dropping them on Puppy’s chest. Willow smiled. That was one of her favorite games with Puppy, she fondly recalled. She then frowned. She couldn’t believe that she was comparing the fun of torturing Puppy with the pleasure(??) of knitting her witch a scarf. She was now inclined to tear her work up.

Willow raised the half finished scarf to her face and enjoyed the softness of the yarn. It would be such a waste of Puppy’s money to tear it up though. And Amy did assure her that the color was the deepest indigo blue that she could find at the craft shop, which was a color Willow was certain would look wonderful on her Tara.

Willow’s knitting needles resumed clicking again.

She had persuaded Puppy into giving her witch ‘Willow support’ checks. If Puppy could buy a mansion, he could easily help Tara feed and clothe Willow, and since he was Family, his ‘Little One’ was not above taking advantage of his money. She had no master, and no sire anymore. Puppy was the next best thing. Unfortunately, her witch was above accepting the money. Willow decided that the next time she saw Jenny she would ask the coven head to convince Tara that ‘Willow support’ was nothing to be ashamed of.

She was beginning to suspect that Tara was doing without so that Willow could have things. She highly doubted that peanut butter and ramen noodles were her witch’s favorite foods.

Which was why Willow was very happy to be able to hunt again. She could not eat Puppy’s stinky butcher’s animal blood, she would rather starve. So Tara had bought her overpriced human blood stock from Willy’s Bar instead, especially to help the vampire heal faster. She hoped Tara would be able to save some money now that Willow could find her food afoot, as was the natural way of doing things.

“I could whore myself,” she realized, as her knitting needles clicked. “Bite the human bite-addicts for money...work at a bleeder’s bar...” She set her needles down at the thought. It was a humiliating idea, and pretty depressing really. But when she thought about it, she wasn’t doing real hunting right now, being blind and all, and dragging her witch around was definitely not fun for her Tara. Her girl needed that time to devote to her studies.

When Willow resumed knitting again, she busied her mind with giving herself a little pep talk. If she didn’t convince herself by the time Tara came home to do the honest thing and become a whore, then Willow will just have to think of something else. It was too bad that her witch didn’t like it when the vampire liberated people of their money. Arguing that her snack victims should compensate the vampire for not killing them had not gone over well.

She rapidly blinked a couple of times as she knitted. There were some very tiny sparklies, in her constant darkness.

She suddenly stopped knitting. She stared harder ahead of her, blinking some more.

There really were tiny sparks of light before her vision. Was she having a weird, medical moment? Was she going to pass out? Maybe she shouldn’t have snacked on her witch’s new mystery herb, hoping it was a hallucinogen.

She kept blinking. The pattern of the sparklies became eerily familiar to her.

They were her witch’s Christmas lights.

* * *

Faith groaned, and managed to smoosh her face further into the macaroni and cheese deli dish on the bathroom floor. For a moment, she thought she had passed out in her own puke. Then she remembered, as she hauled herself up and gingerly felt her jaw--which the blonde Slayer had landed an impressive haymaker on. Tried to feed Buffy again.

A Buffy who was noticeably absent from Gile’s tub, her empty chains littering the porcelain bottom.

“SHIT,” Faith swore, and shakily regained her feet.

* * *

Willow was at the entrance of the dorm building, waiting impatiently for her witch’s return.

She clutched the door frame with excitement. It was night, and Tara was bringing Amy from the Magic Box, but oh, where were they already? Willow had something to show her witch!

She blinked and stared hard into the distance. She wasn’t sure, but the very tiny light she was discerning might be that overhead lamp that lit one of the campus trails to the dorms.

When she tried to stare at the hallway lights above her, that was more confusing, however. Those lights were like shadows, but in reverse. Either that, or she was giving herself eyestrain already. She couldn’t see shapes yet. Little lights were all she could make out, flitting in her familiar darkness. Little lights could only promise to become bigger ones--big, fuzzy ones, even. She could live with that. That meant that soon--soon!! She’ll finally, finally get to see her Tara’s eyes.

“Get away from me!” she heard a girl scream suddenly, from outside, somewhere. “You creep!--AH!!”

Willow’s ears pricked up. Who was that? Debbie Cho? That girl who was always borrowing detergent? If it was her, apparently she wasn’t going to make it back to the dorm building. Willow could hear the scuffle of shoes on grass and the low, derisive laugh of a vampire playing with his meal.

“Help me! Someone help!!”

This being Sunnydale, it wasn’t like anyone was going to answer that plea. He should be going in for the kill now, Willow thought idly, as her fingers drummed on the door frame.

“Please!!”

Willow sighed. Hurry up, she thought.

“HEL--mpfhh!”

A male’s laughter.

“Oh,” Willow spat. “Fuck this!”

She left the door frame and stepped outside.

“Heh hehheh,” the male vampire laughed.

“MmrrHHH!!!” Debbie screamed against his hand.

“Hey you. Stupid,” Willow called, as she made her way across the grass to where the little ‘altercation’ was going on. “Take that somewhere else.”

She could feel the fledge’s incredulity.

“I’m on safe ground,” he protested, easily recognizing Willow as kindred. “I heard the Slayer can’t get within hundr’d feet of this building.”

“Dumb ass,” Willow commented. She pointed down at where she stood. “You’re not even close. The protection ward doesn’t start until over here.” She sensed the fledge’s further surprise, and then heard the labored shuffle as he dragged a struggling Debbie over to where Willow was standing.

Moron, Willow thought smugly, and then lashed out.

Andrew had compared Willow’s uncanny accuracy in sparring to some movie monster called ‘The Predator’--some creature that targeted prey via heat sensoring or whatever. Willow never got to hear the rest of his analogy because she had thought it a great opportunity to gleefully run over while he was nattering and pants him.

She never really thought about it, but maybe she did detect things by heat, or else it would have been Debbie’s face all slashed up by her clawed attack, rather than the male vampire’s.

“Fu--” the male managed to give out, as Willow followed through on her slashing arm to collide with him.

In the confusion, Debbie slipped away with a frightened shriek and conveniently fell off Willow’s radar. That left her and the male tumbling in each other’s arms down the grassy slope outside her witch’s dorm.

When they reached the bottom of the slope, the fledge tried to pin her to the ground.

The male was as big as Puppy and actually heavier, but he wasn’t as good a fighter of course. Willow easily flipped him over and exchanged some nice, violent blows with the fledge. A few vicious kicks were added for good measure. Finally, she got him face down on the grass.

“Nighty night,” she sweetly bade, straddling his back. She got a secure hold of his head and with a hard twist, ripped it right off.

The ‘poof’ of ash immediately after was really satisfying, Willow thought smugly. It was the first time she’d killed anything since before meeting Tara.

“Deb?” Willow called out, dusting her hands from where she sat in the grass. “Where are you? I need a little help--”

In some indiscernible far distance, she heard the ominous slam of a dorm building door.

“Bitch,” Willow bit out. “See if I ever lend you Tara’s detergent again.”

She sat there on the cool ground, trying to get a read on her surroundings.

She sighed. Yeah, right, like as if she really did have internal, special sensors. All she knew was that she was at the bottom of a steep slope. Three different dorm buildings were somewhere above her, and she didn’t know which one was her witch’s.

“Will,” she heard said softly in the distance behind her; a whispered sound carried on the wind.

Willow froze.

Funny how the drift of that voice had reached her first before the dreaded tingle.

“Will,” came the whisper again, traveling on the night breeze. She felt that presence come closer. Steadily closer.

Willow, she told herself. You really should try moving now. Running would be good.

However, her legs chose that moment to act like they did back in that cage. Silly legs.

C’mon, she mentally urged them, feeling just a wee bit hysterical. We want to show Tara that maybe we can see again.

“Will,” she heard said brokenly, that voice no longer sounding brittle, or cold. Just really, really...not together. Which was definitely not of the good.

Bare feet on grass shuffled ever closer to her.

“You,” Willow breathed, thinking she really should stand up now. Stand up, look tuff. Be Vampire. Get up, her inner Willow snarled. “You, got no right to call me that. Or anything. I’ll rip your tongue out,” she finally menaced.

“’m...” the Slayer snuffled. Willow smelled sweat. Old blood beneath bruises. Snot. Tears. “Sorry...so sorry....”

Willow turned and tried frantically to scramble up the slope, stupid legs be damned.

“No!” she heard forcefully cried behind her. “No don’t go! Please!”

Hands--those hard, cruel hands--clutched the waistband of the worn jeans her witch had given her and pulled her back down. Willow swung wildly. Her fist only whistled through the air. She missed!! Shit, how could she have missed!

“Please. I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,” The Slayer sobbed above her. Willow tried not to cower. What was this?? Was this going to be a mercy killing, is that what she was saying sorry for? Willow couldn’t smell wood, but the Slayer could kill her with her bare hands easily.

“Okay, so you’re sorry, fine,” Willow snarled, vainly pulling fierceness over the fear making a really big fool of her. “Do I look like I care? Happy would be me taking your eyes!!”

“I know,” the Slayer said, and her voice moved downwards, like she was--kneeling?? Kneeling in front of Willow? “I know. And...so glad you can see now.” the Slayer laughed weakly. “So glad you’re getting better.”

How could--? Willow thought. How could she know?!

“So you can finally....finally see her eyes,” the Slayer was softly saying.

“What,” Willow barely said.

“Her eyes,” the Slayer whispered tearfully. “Her brav--”

“SHUT UP!” Willow screamed at her. “SHUT UP!!”

“God, had I known,” the Slayer cried, rawness in her voice. “But now...now I understand. The way you feel....it’s so....”

The Slayer broke down for a moment.

“She has,” the Slayer then continued. “One hundred, seventy-five lights in her room......”

No, Willow thought.

“They come in.....sets of thirty-five. Three lights were burned out, but....you helped replace th--”

Willow’s fists flew out, and this time they connected.

She could do nothing but hit and hit and hit and hit, her mouth open in a silent scream as she pounded on the Slayer. She felt flesh give, bone crack, blood fly. The Slayer had no right, no right, no RIGHT--all Willow had was that, her precious love, and now the Slayer had--

I’ll kill you!! Her mind screamed, when her throat could not. I’ll kill you!!

“FUCK!” she heard a tough voice exclaim from afar and something suddenly impacted hard with Willow’s face, sending her crashing back on the grass.

“You little--crazy fuck!!” Faith cried. Willow tried to scramble away.

“TARA!” she desperately screamed. The other Slayer threw her back down on the ground.

“TARA!” Willow screamed again, and felt more blows impact her chest, her ribs, her head--she tried to curl up.

“I should kill you--for B’--I should end your miserable--” Faith cried. She kept kicking her, especially in the head--

Tara, Willow thought. Tara. Sorry. Tara.

“How does that feel?! How do you like it?!” Faith shouted down at her.

The blows kept coming.

Bits of her were breaking.

Her head was going to come off any minute now.

Funny. she could see--

Were those

stars?

in the sky?

Faith’s boot came down hard. Again. Again. Stomp.

Were those her

Tara’s

Christmas

lights?

STOMP

Things were Shining.

Oh. Willow thought. This is. It. Not now. Have to say. I love you.

The kicks finally stopped.

She felt magic.

* * *

Tara did not know what made her run.

It had felt suddenly like the world had lurched and gone upside down, and if she didn’t hurry, it would never be right again.

Amy would say later, that Tara ran because she’d heard Willow scream.

Tara doesn’t remember that. All she remembered was the horrifying scene they found when they headed for the slope.

Tara grabbed Amy’s hand.

“SEPARATE,” she shouted down. Amy’s power made up for the distance. Faith went flying.

And Willow just....laid there.

“I’m sorry,” Buffy cried, in her own huddled mass of blood and tears. “...so sorry....Sorry...”

“We can do a healing spell,” Amy hurriedly babbled as she and Tara hurtled down the slope. “We can do one right now.”

“All she thought of was you--” Buffy cried out in an attempt to tell Tara, as the blonde witch and Amy knelt quickly by Willow’s still form and clasped hands over her. The Slayer’s hand went out pleadingly. “Faith kept...kicking and...and all she wanted was her last thought to be you.”

“What,” Faith roughly ejected, as she staggered to her feet. She ignored the chanting witches. “What the fuck are you saying, B’?”

Faith suddenly clutched her head, eyes wide at the immediate, frightening conclusion she managed to draw from Buffy’s words.

“Everything she knows,” Buffy whispered, her large, wet eyes on the spell being performed before her. “Everything. Like it’s dark now. And she’s swimming. Swimming so hard.”

“Shit,” Faith said brokenly. “B’. Why didn’t you say something? If you’re in some kinda--mind meld--I....I coulda killed you....”

“Air,” Buffy suddenly intoned in a hard voice, concentrating on Willow’s still body.

“HHHHuh,” Willow gasped, her one good eye flying open.

“Kill you,” she rasped out, as Tara and Amy dropped their hands and ended their spell. “Get...out of...my head!”

“Hurts,” Willow then whimpered, realizing with a sudden swell of profound joy that a familiar, warm presence was near.

“Amy, get my kit. And call Angel. And Jenny,” Tara quickly bade, grasping one of Willow’s bruised hands and bringing it reassuringly to her lips. So many parts of Willow were broken, the blonde witch thought, as she tried not to panic.

“What about,” Amy merely said, making an indication with her head in Faith’s direction.

“I can handle her,” Tara curtly answered, not even sparing the dark haired Slayer a glance.

“I’ll get everything,” Amy promised, and began running up the slope.

“All her...fault. She’s, been, in my head!” Willow tried to tell her witch.

“See what you did!” Faith shot off. “Did you know this was gonna happen?!”

“Of course not,” Tara snapped, soothing Willow’s hand. Her and Amy’s spell had stopped the frightening blood flow from Willow’s head, but the blood that had oozed from her ears and eyes was alarming her. “If...if they’re connected in that way, Buffy can block Willow with meditation. It’s simple really,” she added distractedly.

“Simple?!” Faith shouted incredulously.

I...owe her, pain,” Willow whispered, as she felt Tara’s comforting grip. “I want back what’s mine!” she managed to growl.

“Yes,” Buffy said, head bowed. Her blonde locks beneath the moonlight were devoid of color, and streaked dark with her blood. “Willow should have her vengeance.”

The vampire could not believe what the Slayer was saying.

A sudden, demonic elation filled her--a rush of familiar, jubilant darkness that was hungry, ruthless, and greedy.

Cage you, she thought at the Slayer, her throat unable to work from her excitement. Cage you, hurt you--one night--one night to do everything you did to me.

“Yes,” Buffy agreed, out loud. “Everything.”

Willow was ecstatic.

And it was funny, the paradoxes of one’s situation. Even as she crowed and danced madly inside at this final victory over the Slayer, she spasmed suddenly, her witch holding her in alarm. Desperation and fear were in her Tara’s voice.

“Will,” she heard Tara say.

And it was really stupid, that during a moment like this, all weak, and, trying not to make a mess on Tara--with the blood spewing back up--that she should suddenly experience some clarity; for one thing, it had always been about the Slayer, hadn’t it. She killed her Master, she killed her Xander, and still Willow had tried to think like a self preserving vampire--for once--and stayed away from her. Willow didn’t start this. And when the Slayer tortured her? That could have been any vampire. It hadn’t even been about Willow. No, this had always been about that bitch. That stupid, selfish bitch. Messing up, her unlife--again--with the ‘hurt me hurt me, now, I’m Sorry’, well that just--

Fed Up, Now--

Willow spat out the blood she kept coughing up, as her Tara held her.

“YOU,” she ground out. “Keep away from me! Had it with you! Stay away, get out of my life!!

“Stupid--Cry-Buffy!” she further spat. “Wah, you. Wah my dead mommy. Wah, my, dead daddy. Well I don’t--care about your Daddy! Don’t care about your Mommy! Don’t care about your fucking dead girlfriend, and don’t care about you!!” she screamed at the Slayer.

“I know,” Buffy gasped brokenly, guilt and shame tearing at her heart for what she’d done to the vampire in the names of her dead loves. “I know. And.” And when she finally looked up, a sudden illumination swept over the Slayer’s face--a realization that laid itself like a mantle over her suffering and sorrow, blessing her visage with wide-eyed truth. “And it’s okay,” she whispered, staring at Willow with awe.

In the silence that followed, Willow’s bloodied lips merely twisted in a painful sneer.

“Bored now, with your stupid...epiphany,” Willow finally hissed out. She spasmed again. “Don’t feel good,” she whimpered up to Tara.

And she slumped.

And it became black.

* * *
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BRAVE EYES