Cursed Love
Chapter One
The mountains were white and the hills were green. The sky was blue and the river was sparkling. The sun was at its noon and everything was as bright as the smile on the faces of the two young women who sat almost conjoined to each other by the bank.
Distant birds sang with the low blow of the wind in the background as the two hands entangled with each other played lazily. The one with the golden hair leaned down and scooped some water in her hand and brought it to her face. The brunette tilted her head back and closed her eyes due to the brightness of the sun as the cool water ran down her face and to her neck. She was waiting for it to stream downwards when it was intercepted by wet warmth. Her soft smile widened as her heart recognized the touch of the tongue on her skin a little too well. It made its way upward; she opened her mouth slightly anticipating its entrance on her mouth. But this time the blonde changed the path of her tongue and traced it to her earlobe instead and nibbled it a little harder so that she had to open her eyes.
Not wanting to squint at the harsh rays of the sun, the wet faced beauty instead grabbed the smaller woman and let both their bodies fall onto the grass. Once comfortably under her, the blonde beauty’s tongue was still out and was licking off the remainder of the water droplets from her face. When none remained she finally decided to fulfill her anticipation and she let her lips suck her lower lips at first. The brunette raised her head wanting more but she pushed her back, enjoying the foreplay. She lowered herself to kiss the upper lips; just then the brunette’s hand pressed the back of her head forcing her into a deeper kiss. The blonde though reluctant obliged.
As their kiss got deeper, her hands got friskier as she wandered it all over. She touched her arms…then her breasts…she massaged it a little to get a definite moan…she moved it lower to her stomach…she lifted her top to touch the skin … she lingered her finger there for second or two…then she slipped her hand in between her legs…the legs parted and her finger found the heat effortlessly as their tongues were still busy exploring each other.
She loved the warm wetness on her finger…she let her fingers dig deeper into the core of the wetness but…it was different…yes her finger was wet…and yes it was hot but it wasn’t the same. She immediately pulled her hand out and backed up from the kiss. She stared at face below her bewildered as she failed to recognize it. Then her mind kicked in and she brought her hand to see why it had felt different. Her eyes widened as she stared at her hand that was red. Red because it was covered in blood. She jumped right up in shock…she looked down at the woman…whose face was cringed with pain as her hand held on to her stomach from where the blood was oozing out. She took a step back as the spilled blood started to make its way to her feet…she unwillingly looked at the woman again and this time she recognized her…it was Faith…Faith was lying on the ground that was turning red…the hills were turning red…the mountains were turning red…the blue sky was turning red … ‘FAITH’ She screamed looking down at her own hands…which somehow was now holding a dragger…She looked up frantically at the red cloud that was approaching the sun…and looked back down to Faith’s face that was loosing its light and darkening…. “I know you love me…” Faith said before her eyes closed and the cloud completely darkened the entire scene….
“FAITH” Buffy screamed once again.
The mountains were white and the hills were green. The sky was blue and the river was sparkling. The sun was at its noon and everything was as bright as the smile on Willow’s face as she stared at the mesmerizing view from her window.
“What are you smiling at?” Kennedy asked peeking from the covers.
“Oh! The view. Come here…look at it…it’s just so beautiful.” Willow said unwilling to break her stare.
“That’s ok…we were in the car for almost 10 hours…last night…now all I want to do is stay in the bed for the rest of day….” Kennedy was in no mood for looking at any view even though it was already afternoon. “Preferably with my girlfriend.” She added.
Willow turned around just to be see Kennedy laying side ways on the bed with her one hand holding the sheet open giving Willow an eyeful of what she had to offer. The offer Willow Rosenberg couldn’t refuse.
After the hellmouth was closed the Scoobies had an open invitation from Angel to join them in LA. Most of the potentials went back to their own lives, some who liked the thrill along with Faith accepted Angel’s invitation. But, that wasn’t something that neither Buffy nor Willow wanted to do, even though they both did want to stay in business of saving lives. That’s when Kennedy had come up with a plan to open their own detective agency for supernatural investigations and the three women had jumped up and down thinking they had found a perfect solution. What they hadn’t anticipated was the empty office with a phone that never rang and the bills that piled up with every passing day. That was of course till Giles decided to help and started forwarding cases to their agency. Very soon they made their name in the market and started having their own cases. One of which cases brought them to this town.
A month ago a newly wed couple Dina Shah and Jack Jackson came to this particular little town for honeymoon. They had even bought that particular house where the sleuths had arrived the night before. Now a month later the couple had both disappeared. Dina’s family had contacted their office and here they were.
“You know Buffy as much as we like you, we don’t want the details of your sex life.” Kennedy said seriously as soon as she saw the older slayer walking into the kitchen.
Buffy narrowed her eyes wondering what she was talking about.
“We just heard you…that’s all.” Willow clarified a little embarrassed as though she was the one who had screamed.
“Heard what?” Buffy asked innocently as she poured herself some coffee.
“FAITH…..FAITH….” Kennedy imitated the scream that startled them. “Now we know you fantasize about Faith but hell we don’t need to know when …after all even we keep it low…it’s called being polite.”
Buffy’s gaze automatically fell on her hands remembering the nightmare she had. Pain quickly flooded her heart as the scene of blood all over her hand and Faith’s face darkening with everything else repeated before her eyes. She had stabbed Faith once and she had watched the blood come out of her before, but the scene in her nightmare was different. It wasn’t the same Faith. It was first someone else. And it certainly wasn’t her. It was like she was watching two different women almost having sex, when everything changed and the woman on the ground became Faith and on the top was her, with Faith dying and her with blood-drenched dragger in her hand. Yes, it certainly wasn’t the same because the last time Faith had survived.
“Ken stop it.” Willow elbowed her girlfriend hoping she wouldn’t embarrass her best friend seeing that Buffy had remained silent.
“It is not like that…” Buffy nodded her head to bring herself back to reality. “I actually had a nightmare…”
“Come on Faith …Faith….ummm…doesn’t sound like nightmare to me.” Kennedy just couldn’t help but tease the older slayer whom she knew had a thing for the Faith from the time she had seen them together. And Kennedy was rarely wrong about these things.
Before Buffy could have her say, the phone rang and Kennedy left the kitchen to answer it, leaving the two friends alone. Willow who had desperately sought Buffy’s approval when she had come out, was a little shocked to find herself feeling uncomfortable about the fact that Buffy might be gay too. She wasn’t sure if she was just shocked at the possibility or that she actually did not approve of it. May be it was just because of Faith, she reasoned her thoughts.
“I just had a dream about Faith that’s all. It wasn’t really like …” Buffy thought she would at least explain to her friend.
“That’s ok Buffy.” Willow interrupted unwilling to be the confidant for details regarding her feelings towards Faith. If what Kennedy had hinted was true, Willow didn’t want to know about it. “I don’t want to know.”
“But this you want to know.” Kennedy said walking inside. “That was the local police I had informed them that we were coming to investigate the disappearance. Apparently there is a cave about two miles from here, and they want us to go and check it out.”
“Did they say why?” Willow asked welcoming the distraction.
“Nope, the dude just said you might find your answers there.”
“When do you want to go?” Buffy asked.
“How about now…?”
The cave was nothing scary compared to the ones that they had seen. It was just big. It was like a huge hole on a side of a hill that just went on and on as the three women walked on and on.
“Is there an end to this or we are just going to around the world while we are at it.” Kennedy complained.
“There has to be.” Buffy said who was walking couple of steps ahead of the couple.
“May be the cops were the ones that killed the Jacksons and this is their plan to trap us in the cave.” Willow who had protested to come inside voiced her pessimism.
“Don’t worry baby, if they trap us I’ll protect you.” Kennedy said always willing to be Willow’s savior.
“Really.” Willow’s eyes were open wide as she contemplated the idea of being saved by her girlfriend. “Even when there is a big bad monster in our trail just like the last time?”
“Yes, baby just like the last time.” Kennedy was saying when the couple who were looking at each other instead of their path bumped right into Buffy. “What the fuck…”
Kennedy didn’t finish her sentence as her eyes fell on what had made Buffy freeze. The three women were staring at life size statues, hundreds of them, lined up neatly in hundreds of rows and columns that seemed like it went on forever.
“Wow…” Willow remarked as she tried to catch the end of the row. “How many statues are there?”
“Thousands.” A familiar voice somewhere from the middle of the statues replied.
“There doesn’t seem to be an end to these statues, so I am assuming thousands.” Faith was saying as she came into the view of her former allies.
“Faith…what are you doing here?” Kennedy was the one who asked as both Willow and Buffy were too shocked to ask.
“Jack Jackson’s father is a client of Wolfman and Hart’s, when he disappeared Angel wanted me to come and find out what was happening. What brings ya’ll here?”
“Well, Dina’s parents hired us to find their daughter.” Willow replied.
“Why are Dina’s and Jack’s family hiring two different firms to investigate this? I mean, should they be joining forces to find them.” Buffy wondered allowed as she opted to think about the case at hand rather than listen to her heart that was constantly racing because of Faith.
“Why you don’t know?” Faith was surprised that Buffy was in more dark than she was. “Dina and Jack eloped. Their family was against their marriage.”
“So, what are these statues about?” Willow asked realizing that Faith had more information than they did.
“I don’t know. They look too damn real to me.” Faith was staring at one that was exactly her size. “Like someone froze a living person.”
“I feel the same thing.” Kennedy agreed as she started walking in between the statues.
Buffy and Willow took their turn to do the same as they inspected one after another statue. What they were looking for they didn’t know but that was soon answered when Kennedy hollered for everyone to rush to her.
“Look at her.” She said once everyone was by her side.
The women stared at the statue that Kennedy was pointing at.
“Is it just me or she looks just like Dina?”
“That is Dina.”