Transitions - Ch. 43

"Giles," Buffy said, "What are you thinking?"

Giles shot her a sharp look, one of those glances-of-warning Buffy suspected she never quite caught the complete meaning of, full of something like that text-and-subtext stuff Giles tended to talk about.

Buffy's own thinking leaned in one direction, and one direction only: that their odds of coming through this sucked big-time, and that she and her friends were about to die. The six of them versus flying fatality times thirty? Not much of a contest.

She watched the redheads, trying not to be obvious or to cause offense by looking at them the wrong way, since they seemed like the kind of people who might take offense easily--like they were just waiting for somebody to screw up, and then ffft-thud, no more Scooby Gang.

Could this day get any more crappy? Buffy wondered, then decided the answer had to be "no." First sorcery and Hellmouthiness, then shadows with claws and teeth, now this? At least she'd learned better, at this point, than to stamp her foot and say, "Not fair!"--even though it wasn't.

Geez, was it really, truly too much to ask that they be allowed to go to a funeral, visit a little with family and friends, then come safely home? Apparently, where she and Giles were concerned, it was.

After glancing at Giles's expression, Buffy knew better than to open her mouth and say something clueless. The crossbow-girls, whoever they were, looked less than overwhelmed with joy to see her own little group in their creepy forest.

"Giles?" she repeated, in a lower voice.

"Fascinating," Giles murmured, studying the women who surrounded them. At least part of the look on his face told her he might be exactly that. Try as she might, Buffy couldn't help but feel irritated: she'd braved hell to save his life. Where did Giles get off being fascinated?

"Thank you, Mr. Spock, for that illuminating answer," Xander put in, backing closer to Buffy and Giles. "But what I really wanna know is, are we toast or what?"

"Hear, hear," Buffy muttered. She really didn't like the way the redheads were eyeing her--like she was not only going to be killed, but possibly stewed and eaten.

Giles straightened, one of those patented, ultra-calm Giles expressions now plastered on his face-- but Buffy suddenly tumbled to the fact that he wasn't really so cool and collected after all. She could see a tiny muscle jumping over his jaw, and his eyes were a dark, green-tinged gray. He glanced at Willow, who still lay unconscious on the ground, then back at Sebastian and poor, shaky-looking Celeste. Underneath his pseudo-calmness lay only tiredness, stress, and worry--a combination she'd seen from him too many times to count.

Buffy edged to Giles's side and touched his back, offering support the only way she knew how. He shot her a brief glance of gratitude.

Giles kept his hands out, the palms spread open. He'd lost his sling somewhere, and the bandages were grubby, but Buffy couldn't see any fresh blood on them. At least he hadn't hurt his hand again. In fact, except for looking worn out in the extreme, he seemed better than he had in a while. Less sad, more focused. And alive--oh, God, and alive. She was overcome, suddenly, with a nearly uncontrollable urge to hug him, even though she knew this was the worst possible time.

He was alive. She hadn't lost him--not to the fire, or the demon, not into hell. Unless this was hell, and she didn't think so. Weird, yes. Majorly monstery. But not hell.

Where had Will and Ethan brought them, though?

Giles said something in a quiet voice, speaking a language that kind of resembled French, Buffy thought--in the way that a poodle resembles a Rottweiler. He bent to retrieve his sword, holding it up like a cross with his hand curled around the blade, which made her cringe a little.

The apparent leader of the red-headed women--who was youngish, about Celeste's age, and wore her hair in the longest braid Buffy had ever seen--gave an angry answer. Giles nodded. Seconds later, his blood began to drip down the silvery metal.

"Giles!" Buffy said, shocked. She'd known what he'd been about to do would be cringe-worthy.

He told the leader something else, in the same inoffensive voice. She gave a sharp little nod, following up what he'd said with a whole string of other words, which Giles also answered, though he looked like he was trying not to let his worry show. A few of the other women got involved, debating back and forth, and then they all seemed to take a vote, nodding one by one.

The first womanr slung her crossbow on a leather strap across her back. Giles returned his sword to its sheathe. The woman took his hand, opening it up, looking at the cuts across the fingers and palm. They weren't deep, thank God--obviously, bad cuts weren't required. This was just another weird ritual, done to prove some point that Buffy didn't understand.

"You are exactly as The Morgana described," the woman said, in English this time, her accent soft and furry-sounding, like the accent Moira slipped into when she was losing it a little. She glanced up at Giles with a small, flickering grin, the kind that made Buffy nervous. Her eyes were huge and dark-green, also like Moira's. "Brave, and quite mad."

"Might you be Briony St. Ives?" Giles asked.

"The Morgana's talked of us, out there amongst the English?" The woman didn't look particularly happy about that. Her grin faded, scowl-lines appeared between her eyebrows. Her sisters, cousins, aunts, whatever, mumbled some more between themselves.

"Only in passing," Giles assured her. "I'd wondered who minded things here, whilst Moira was away, and she mentioned your name. She trusts you, Miss St. Ives." Their green eyes did complicated things at each other, each changing color half-a-dozen times.

Buffy got a weird vibe off the woman--off all the red-haired women, and it wasn't just that the rest of them were still aiming their crossbows, and looked perfectly ready to use them. They all had on boy-clothes, and not only that--boy-clothes that were, literally, five hundred years out of date--boots, and thick black tights, not-quite-kneelength black suede tunics with strappy belts and things to hold their weapons. Buffy could feel magic all over them, and all over the place where they lived. Now that things had settled down, with the monsters being crispy critters, the forest didn't really seem quite so Hellmouthy. It didn't seem like a trip to the park either, though--not even a park in Sunnydale, unless it was maybe the new one that Giles had so recently provided.

Not to mention it being winter in that woods-- Buffy couldn't help but wonder what might possibly be up with that? Even as she wondered, though, she knew. Red-heads? Strangeness? These were Moira's people, Moira's family--and the weirdness all around her was nothing but magic, magic everywhere. Maybe some of the older redheads were the people the vampire Helena had referred to as Moira's bad aunties, the ones she'd wanted to kill.

On the whole, Buffy thought, she much preferred Giles's family, unusual as they were. At least his aunts didn't feel the need to point crossbows at your heart when you came to visit.

"We don't use the name St. Ives in here," the woman, Briony, said--in a tone that could easily be called threatening. "The Morgana ought to have told you."

"Miss LeFaye, then," Giles said politely. "I am, unfortunately, somewhat unfamiliar with your customs. My companions and I will, of course, abide by all your commands."

The woman turned away. "Come, if you like."

Buffy, Giles and Xander scrambled to collect their weapons and get themselves sorted out, knowing there wasn't really going to be much liking involved in the "if you like." What Briony St. Ives, or LeFaye, or whatever she called herself, really meant was that they'd better come along with a quickness, or else. Sebastian and Xander lifted Celeste in a chair-carry, and Giles picked up Willow.

The women in black formed a circle around the their little group, moving them out through the forest at pretty hard pace. It wasn't easy going, either, all uphill and through plenty of underbrush. Pretty soon the guys were breathing hard, and not too long after that they started staggering--but, being guys, they couldn't just say, "Slow down, give us a break, we're tired."

Not that it would have done much good anyway.

About five miles into it, almost at the edge of the woods, they met up with a second set of red-heads. This group carried spears instead of crossbows, which they used with a fair amount of enthusiasm to prod along their more-than-reluctant prisoner: Ethan Rayne.

At least, Buffy thought it was Ethan. The height and build looked about right for her least-favorite evil sorcerer, but his usually pristine clothes--Buffy was counting pristine as her Giles-word of the day--although they had escaped the hell-basement pretty much intact, were now caked with mud and practically shredded, showing skin that was almost entirely either red or purple. Ethan's face had been battered almost to the point of being unrecognizable, his lips split and swollen, nose obviously broken, both eyes nearly puffed shut. Anyone she hated less, seeing him like that, Buffy would have felt sorry for.

The leader of group two, who was older, with a lot of iron-gray in her red hair, snapped something at Briony, who gave Giles a hard look, then asked him a suspicious-sounding question in her not-French language.

Giles, panting hard, didn't look like he had a whole lot of endurance left, but he did manage to produce a polite answer. He shifted Willow's position on his shoulder, then talked some more, a serious expression on his face.

Briony didn't appear to be buying whatever it was he told her--in fact, she looked furious. She gave Giles a hard shove, almost making him lose his balance. Her crossbow bounded back into her hand, like it was magic--which is probably was. She definitely had some kind of Jedi Knight thing going on there.

In his nicest voice, Giles tried to tell her something else to calm her down, but Briony still wasn't buying. She whacked him hard across the midsection with the crossbow, and then he did go to his knees, nearly dropping Willow.

"Hey!' Buffy exclaimed. "You wanna stop that--like now?"

"Buffy--" Giles gasped, getting himself back under control fast. "Best not to antagonize. Our position here, as trespassers, is precarious at best."

Briony said something scornful--there just wasn't any other way to describe it. Buffy decided that she hated her, but she looked in Giles's eyes and saw that he was serious. No matter how much she wanted to produce some snappy comeback, with the option to kick some sorceress butt, this wasn't the time or place. These women could--and still might--hurt them.

"You okay?" she whispered to Giles finally.

"Yes, yes, fine," he answered, sounding distracted, even as Buffy grabbed his arm to help Giles haul himself to his feet again. He shifted Willow a second time, hiding her face against his chest, and Buffy wondered if that was deliberate--if maybe he didn't want the women to catch a look at Will's face, but was trying not to be obvious about concealing it from them.

Buffy wished she could lend a hand there, too--because, hiding Willow or not, Giles's arms had to be getting tired. The fact was, though, that she could easily carry something Willow's weight, but not Will's size. Although she'd tried, her friend was actually a little taller than she was, and it just got too awkward, like trying to carry a big, rolled-up rug. Not that she'd ever put it that way to Will herself. She had some sense of tact.

Briony and Giles traded another set of looks, and then she said to him, "Come along."

Sebastian chose that moment to speak up, saying something in yet another foreign language than the not-French Giles and the LeFaye leader had been speaking. Giles gave his son an almost panicked "shut up!" look, but it was too late--Briony went ballistic. She threw her crossbow to the ground and pointed at Seb, stretching out the index finger of her left hand. Her eyes went off like flashbulbs, so bright Buffy was dazzled. Seb went flying.

Sebastian hit a big old oak tree hard, shaking down twigs and leaves. He lay across the roots, stunned. Xander barely managed to keep Celeste from hitting the ground, and she gasped at the sudden rough shift in her position.

"Bastian," she breathed.

Ethan's swollen face twisted into something as close as it get to one of his usual sarcastic leers. "Yeah," he whispered, in a thick, choked voice. "Welcome home, you young pillock. Family's not exactly welcoming you with open arms, are they?"

"Ethan, be quiet," Giles said softly. "That's enough." Carefully, he stood Willow on her feet, passing her to Buffy's waiting arms. Will's head lay heavily on Buffy's shoulder, but her friend had begun to mutter and come around, even though her knees continued to do the buckling thing.

"All of you, not another word," Giles commanded, nothing like his old hesitant self at all. It hit Buffy that he really was fighting for their lives, and that Seb, whatever he'd said, had just screwed up royally.

"Briony--" Giles began, then started talking soothingly in not-French again, even as he bent over his son. He felt Seb's pulse, then gave him one good hard slap, followed by another. Sebastian woke up fast, a look of shock on his face as he flung up his hand to stop a third blow.

"Get up if you possibly can," Giles told him in a tense voice, so low that only Buffy, with her superior hearing, and Sebastian himself could make out the words. "And be quiet. You're in greater danger here than any of us."

"But Dad..." Sebastian began.

"Keep quiet. Don't advertise. Do you think it coincidence that these LeFayes are all women? And for God's sake, Seb, whatever you do, you must attempt no magic. Is that clear?"

Wide-eyed, Sebastian reached out a hand, and Giles pulled him to his feet. "But they're my--"

Even looking at the back of Giles's head, Buffy knew he was glaring.

"You may be my son here, Sebastian. And you may be Gemma Delacoeur's son. That's all. Are we clear?"

"As crystal." Sebastian rubbed the bridge of his nose, a gesture so completely Giles-y it was nearly funny--then shook his head to clear it. He and Celeste exchanged frightened glances.

"Listen to your father, Bastian," she told him.

"May we proceed?" Giles asked Briony in his softest, most polite voice.

The redhead refused to speak English, but responded with another angry burst of not-French. The sky--what could be seen of it through the branches--went light and dark and light again. The air got even colder, then colder still, before they at last stepped out of the forest and back into summer.

The warmth should have been comforting, but it wasn't. Instead it pressed against Buffy and made her chest hurt. She tried to look around, tried to orient herself to the real world again--but she wasn't sure, suddenly, if anything was real.

The place they stood in might have been a garden. There was stone, lots of it--twisty paths and low fences. There was dark grass, and dark bushes, with half-a-dozen peacocks strutting between them, their long tails trailing the ground. Buffy shuddered as the birds' beady eyes turned to her, and they screamed, with such a loud, scary sound she had to put her hands over her ears to block out what she could.

When she finally looked up again she saw the house, as if it hadn't been there before--but of course it must have, always. An old, half-ruined tower stood off to one end, and the house itself was huge--no, not even that. Massive--that was the word. More like a mountain than a house really, and like a mountain, all the walls were gray, and there were steep roofs and crooked chimneys all over everywhere.

The windows seemed to be watching.

Buffy tried to imagine growing up in a place like that, and couldn't. The house was worse than scary, it was hateful. She felt like it wanted to hurt her--to hurt all of them. It made her want to cry, the way she had when she was little and the Kindestod killed her cousin Celia, the way she had, as a kid, when she heard noises outside, or somewhere in the house, that she couldn't understand, and her mom and dad didn't seem to hear her calling.

You're the Slayer, Buffy told herself. You've faced hundreds of scary things, and faced them punning. But she couldn't face this. She just couldn't.

Without even realizing what she was doing, Buffy backed up behind Giles and pressed her face against him, surprised to find Xander already there beside her, like a little kid hiding behind his dad. Willow, back in Giles's arms, made a little whimpering sound, and even Sebastian and Celeste had huddled nearer.

This is it, Buffy thought, This is it. We are so gonna die.