Title: The Retrieval (1/?)
Part Two of the Summons Series, Sequel to 'The Elsewhere'
Author: Morgan R.
Email: [email protected]
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Angel visits Sunnydale to help w/stuff
Spoilers: Season 4 spoilers
Feedback: Love some
Disclaimer: The words are mine, Sunnydale and its residents (present and former) are the property of Joss & Co.
Note: You guys didn't really think I was done, did you?
****
"Giles, I'm worried about her. She's so detached."
"Does she refuse to talk about it?"
"She just denies that there's anything to talk about. But I've never seen her like this..."
The object of their discussion sat outside in the courtyard of Giles' building, staring up at the sky. She didn't hear a word. She just stared up into the heavens, her blank eyes awash with stars as she remembered evenings on the battlements, his strong, warm hands wrapped about her waist as they taught their children about the constellations. Jesse had invented his own stories about the celestial shapes. He always loved it when his mother wore her diamond coronet because it looked like it was made of his precious stars. His own wife had always worn diamonds for him-
She pulled her eyes down. Here was the present, here was her world. The hard surface of the chair. The row of mailboxes, and no queen would ever stay here.
Unless she was not a queen, and her memories had never existed.
"Willow?"
She turned her face up to the square of light, and a friend stood in the door, outlined in black against the glow. "Are you coming in?"
She stood without the swish of skirts, and she walked without the burden of a crown. She was free and young, but she had never valued anything so much as that particular matrimonial confinement.
Except that her husband was dead, and worse, he had not called, and she slowly went inside.
****
The hiss of his silver blade was all he could hear at night. He wore no armor other than his blank, dark mask, and every demon was his father again, and he killed them all.
But when he lay in the quiet, trying to remember how to sleep all alone, he was the one who died. He would write love letters in his mind, he whispered into the darkness, trying to craft epistles to a wife who no longer belonged to him. Every one fell short, every word was a failure. He could make no apologies, he could make no promises. He had nothing to give.
Every possible consolation was withheld- no more sunrises to bask in, no more favorite foods to seek out. His children did not come to him for advice, and his grandchildren did not giggle when he produced treats out of thin air.
As for her-
Delicate hands of a lady running through his hair, and her serenely beautiful royal countenance, melted away. He would have killed to get them back, to bring her back- but he killed every night, and she never appeared. He had no wife, and no brother. He was rootless, and belonged to no country or people. Generations of loved ones had dissolved away before he could stop anything. Unparalleled anguish.
As it was, the most that he could do was to try and spread that anguish out- let creatures he despised feel his rage, killing being all he was interested in anymore.
****
Willow sat silently, the hum of the conversation swirling around her as her eyes stared towards some distant point. She didn't catch the worried glances, the helpless shrugs. She sat with her back straight, her hands spread out gracefully on the arms of her chair. She sat as she had been used to sitting for decades, in a throne made of gold. She sat regally without effort. She sat alone, but that part broke her heart every day.
Willow looked up as Buffy rested her hand on her arm. "Willow?"
She forced herself to undo her training as a queen, to remember what being a teenager was supposed to be like- abandon the dignified smile- try not to look superior-
"Yes, Buffy?" For the first time in a long time she looked into her friend's eyes, and those eyes were on the verge of filling with tears of concern.
"Willow, you're not yourself. Did something happen in LA?"
Willow ached at the truest words she had heard since Angel last said he loved her. Not herself, no, she was not herself. She was someone else stuck in her own body, she was a woman and a mother and a grandmother and a monarch and a person completely in love and she was forbidden all of those things- no, she was not herself.
"Nothing happened in LA." Another truth. Absolutely nothing happened in that city. Her world had been turned upside down somewhere else, in a small kingdom with a fiercely loyal populace and a warm hearted king she adored-
"You sure?"
Willow looked up at Buffy before she remembered to mask the pain, to hide the loss somewhere in the depths of her aged gaze, and her friend stifled an exclamation. "Oh, Willow, there has to be something I can do to help you!"
But the royal eyes were well bred blanks once more, and she shook her head without a word.
The door burst open, and Spike ran in with muttered curses. "Ready to kill, Slayer?"
"What is it, Spike?" Giles asked.
"Nensilek demons. Lots of them."
Giles cursed then. "What stage?"
"Still hatching."
Giles grabbed one of the books on his desk. "That gives us a few hours, then. Which means we can call Angel, because we will definitely need his help."
If anyone had thought to notice, it was remarkable how similar the expression on her face was to that on Buffy's. "Is it that bad?"
Giles looked grimly apologetic. "I'm afraid so. In fact, you might want to go to Willy's- see if there are any demons there who can fight."
Buffy looked at him in confusion. "Why would any demons help me fight other demons?"
"Because these are Nensilek demons, and it is in everyone's best interest, demon and human, if they are wiped out before morning comes. I'll call Angel."
Buffy walked out without another word, and Willow remained frozen in her chair.
The king was on his way...
****
Angel stepped out of his car with a staggering reluctance. He looked up at Giles' house, his eyes dark and enigmatic.
He could feel them both. He could feel Buffy, his blonde goddess of so many years, the golden girl he had worshipped without ever dreaming she would return the favor.
But even more strongly, for the first time in this world, he felt Willow- his queen, his sweetheart, his strength. And while the love he had shared with Buffy had been tempestuous and exquisite in its impossibility, he had shared his life with Willow. He had shared years with her, they had pledged their lives to one another. She had borne his children, she had watched him grow old with a tender smile on her face.
With halting, difficult, footsteps, he walked towards both of them.
****
As soon as she heard the car pull up outside, Buffy gripped Willow's arm tightly. "Will, he's here-"
Willow turned her face away, determined to maintain her composure. It was a queen's duty to never show weakness.
Buffy turned to her. "Willow, Giles is going to make us hunt this thing in pairs. Could you go with Angel?"
Blank green eyes answered her.
"I mean, Xander will be more interested in insulting him than killing demons, and Giles has to go alone to do the ritual, and I just thought that you wouldn't mind. Because I just can't walk around with him, and this is me begging you-"
There's his knock on the door, keep your face frozen, Willow, don't let the heartbreak show.
Angel had arrived.
****
It was like a reunion, only without the joy. Angel and Willow were hunting together without a word. Their weapons were hardly as dangerous as the memories they were carrying.
They had already killed fourteen hatchlings before a single thing was said. Willow had been thrown to the ground as they fought the last demon, and Angel quickly dispatched it before coming over to her side and helping her stand.
"Are you okay?" he asked quietly.
She had promised herself that she would maintain her composure, but there were too many factors at work. His hand was still at her elbow, and his voice was as beautiful as she remembered. Then she looked up at him, and even a second of eye contact was too much. Their marriage had been founded in beautiful honesty- how could she learn to lie to him now?
Was she okay?
"No," she whispered.
The tears came then, unbidden and unwanted and inattentive to all of her crumbling self control. They slipped down her cheeks as she shook her head, knowing that all her good intentions were just so much futility.
His hand released her elbow, only to travel upward, and he brushed away the tears on her cheeks with the familiar tenderness she sometimes fancied she had imagined. A light breeze dried her face a bit more, and she cursed herself for a fool as she brought her own hand to clasp at his wrist.
He sighed in despair and relief. "Willow, do you...?"
The question went unfinished, if only because there were too many possible endings. Did she remember? Blame him? Miss him? Want to see her children and friends? Long for his kisses? Wish it had never happened? Dream about the world they had lost? Break again every day he didn't appear?
Did she still love him?
"Yes."
The wind blew stronger, when memory suddenly lashed into her. "Angel- the wind-"
But the sentence was not to be completed, because a sight too familiar appeared. Black void, whether floating three feet away or lurking in her heart- pulsing, reaching, taking-
And then they were gone in a whirlwind of disappearing.
****