Buffy stood in the lobby of the Hyperion, hugging Willow with a joy that surprised even her.  She hadn’t realized how much she had missed her friend until this moment.

        “I didn’t expect you.”  Willow looked almost more shocked than pleased, and Buffy’s pleasure diminished a bit.

        “I didn’t expect me either until about an hour ago,” said Buffy in a more tentative tone than she had used to call her first hello, “but I needed to talk to you, and Xander told me you were here.  I tried to call, but you didn’t answer and I thought it would be too hard to explain in a message.  So since I was in town visiting my dad anyway, I took a chance on finding you.”

        “Needed to talk to me?  What’s wrong?”  Now Willow seemed nervous, and she kept looking over her shoulder and back up the stairs at approximately two second intervals.

        Buffy shifted impatiently.  “Don’t worry, Willow.  I’ve seen Angel recently, remember?  It’s never exactly smooth sailing between us, but I’m hoping we won’t actually remake The Perfect Storm this time.  Besides, I wanted show you this thing, not to mention the just wanting to see my best friend.”

        “What thing?”  Willow’s brow was still furrowed with worry.  “Magical stuff?  I thought you’d given up slayage and were just being all ordinary these days.”

        “I’m trying.  But—I guess all that stuff about not being able to get rid of a reputation is true.  Even when I’m visiting my dad and acting like any other normal college drop-out trying to find a decent job, people seem to know about me.  Someone gave me this thing that worried her and asked me if I’d figure out what it was for.  It seemed pretty much to belong in your territory.”  Buffy moved between her friend and what seemed to be a constant source of distraction.  “Willow, what are you afraid is going to come down those stairs?  I really can face Angel.  And I’ve seen Cordelia and lived to tell about it, you know!”

        “It—it’s not Cordelia.  Buffy, there’s something I’ve been trying to figure out how to tell you for a while.”  Willow took her friend’s arm and began towing her towards a door that led outside.  Buffy had a glimpse of a small, enclosed garden as she was pulled away from the hotel lobby.  The enclosure looked deserted of everything except flowers and a small fountain.

        “What?”

        But Willow seemed to be having trouble finding the words to get directly to her point.  “I tried calling you last week, but you were traveling to your aunt’s and when we talked there were people in the room with you, remember?  So I didn’t say anything, and now—”

        “Bloody hell!” A familiar voice exploded in wrath.  “Watch where you put your boots, you daft bint!”

        They had just stepped out into the garden—and almost on top of its one inhabitant, who was crouched on the ground near the lobby door.  He stood up, his blue eyes wrathful as he ran his tanned hands through his dark blonde hair, which was already mussed and streaked with chalk. His black jeans and t-shirt were similarly stained.

        Buffy stared at him, unable even to think for a moment.  The world seemed to heave and shift around her. 

        The man tilted his head to one side, rolling his eyes in exaggerated annoyance.  He pointed to the pavement, where elaborate chalk lines had been etched—and then smeared by Buffy’s shoes.  “Took me a good half-hour to get that symbol right.”  His gaze slipped over her in momentary evaluation.  There was not the least shadow of recognition in his expression.

        It was him.  It could be no one else.  The irascible blue gaze was the same, as was that irritating tilt to his head and the expressive way he quirked his scarred eyebrow.  No one else had cheekbones like that, or could purse his lips in a way that was both annoying and damnably hot. 

And he wasn’t the same.  It was more than just the simple, overwhelming fact that he was not bursting into flames.  His hair was bleached, but not with peroxide.  The tips of the unruly locks looked as if they had been lightened naturally by the California sun that was even now beating down on both of them.  And his scent was different; instead of ashes and cool earth, his skin radiated warmth, and it was covered with a sheen of sweat.   He had been doing something with the plants on the patio, and he smelled of growing things.   There were streaks of brown earth mixing with the chalk marks on his hands.  His skin was darker, and there was a visible tan line showing where his t-shirt had rucked up near his shoulder. 

        Finally, Buffy found her voice.  “Spike?” she asked incredulously.

        Spike.  That was one of the names he answered to.  It was the one the people in this hotel used when they talked to him.  But he had found himself turning around on the street once when a woman called out, “William!”  She had been talking to someone else, though, and he had gone on his way without worrying about the incident.

        This strange girl used his name as if she had said it many times before.  But she was surprised to see him.  He blinked at her.  She was very pretty, but too slight for his taste.  And, right now, she radiated tension and shock.

        “Oh, no,” Willow was saying in a stricken voice.  “Spike.  I forgot.  I was thinking you’d have to wait until dark to start the symbol.”

        He turned to the witch.  She could be foolish sometimes, but he thought she knew her craft too well to make a stupid statement like that.  “Why would you think the ritual would have to wait until dark?” he demanded.  “The sodding demons use light energy.  Only makes sense to do it now and get some of that force on our side.”

        Besides, he liked the daylight, and he had looked forward to working in the small garden on this blazing California afternoon.  The warmth of the sun beating on his head was a pleasure he sought out without questioning just why it felt so strange and new.

        The pretty blonde girl—if her skin hadn’t suddenly gone so ghastly pale under her tan he would have been more caught up in admiring her looks—was still staring at him.  She sank down on to the stone bench behind her, her gaze never wavering from his face.  As her eyes grew large and began to glisten with tears, he shifted uneasily.  “Uh, sorry,” he said.  “Didn’t mean to call you a daft bint.  Got a bit of a temper.  Say lots of stupid things.”

        “You don’t remember me,” she whispered.

        “No,” he admitted.  Bloody hell.  Now a tear was rolling down her cheek.  She was looking at him as if he were a ghost.  Or something worse. 

        He took a step forward and went down on one knee before her, bringing himself to her eye level again.  The pose seemed perfectly natural somehow.

        “Uh, I’m sorry,” he repeated, making it more than an apology for yelling or not knowing her name.  “I don’t—look, I don’t know why you’re crying.  But whatever I did to make you feel so bloody awful, I’m sorry.”

        “No!” She jumped up, her expression agonized.  “Don’t—whatever you do, don’t say that.  You’re not the one who—”  She turned, caught Willow’s gaze for a stricken moment, and ran into the hotel.

        “Bugger this,” said Spike.  Still kneeling, he turned to look up at Willow. “What’s wrong with Miss America?”

        “Don’t worry,” said Willow.  “I’ll talk to her.”  She glanced over her shoulder.  “I need to talk to her right away.  But don’t you worry.  Okay?”

        He shrugged.  “I’m good at not worrying, pet.  You know that.”

        Buffy fell onto the sofa near the hotel’s reception desk, her legs giving way beneath her.  She dropped her face in her hands and caught her breath in gasping sobs.

        “Buffy!”  Willow was beside her.  “I’m sorry.  If I’d had any idea he was out there—”

        “He’s alive,” said Buffy.  “Really alive.  Human.”

        “Yeah,” said Willow. 

        “How?” Buffy was clinging to Willow for support and reassurance now.       

        “Wesley said there was some prophecy that this might happen.  They’d expected Angel to get the reward, but after what happened in Sunnydale, it makes sense that it would be Spike.  Well, as much sense as a prophecy ever makes.”

        “He doesn’t remember me,” said Buffy numbly, her face buried in her friend’s shoulder.

        “He doesn’t remember anything. And—”  Willow shifted uneasily.  “And, Buffy, he doesn’t seem to mind not remembering.”  Gently, she stroked the other girl’s hair.

        Spike stood up and stared after the two girls.  In spite of the reassurance he had given Willow, he couldn’t help wondering what was wrong.  Apparently, there had been some major cock-up and he’d had a role in it.  That seemed a likely enough scenario.  Spike vaguely suspected that his past was littered with major cock-ups of one sort or another.

Most of the time, the lack of any memory of his past didn’t disturb him.  He knew what he was.  He was a bloke who liked killing demons and who knew just how to go about his job. Who he had been seemed unimportant.  He realized that most people could remember farther than a few months into their own past, but then most people weren’t bloodsuckers like Angel, or demons like Lorne, or witches like Willow, or the walking dead like Lilah.  That was why he’d hoped at first that he could fit in here, even though he was sure most of the inhabitants of the hotel didn’t like him.  Being despised by most of his acquaintance seemed normal and right too.

        Besides, a few of them were fair enough company.  Lorne had some brilliant stories and always knew where to find quality booze. And Gunn had a bloody good DVD collection.

        Spike knew that some of the others had recognized him that first night when he had found them trying to take out a nest of vampires and had pitched in to help.  Cordelia and Wesley had been worried and suspicious, and Willow had stared at him with a stunned amazement that had gradually changed to real joy.  He had been absurdly pleased to know someone was glad to see him.  Willow was still the one whose company he most enjoyed, even though he realized that giddy cow Fred had more chance of getting into her pants than he did.

        Angel’s reaction had been hardest to read.  For one thing, Spike’s attention during that first encounter had been focused on deciding whether to follow his instincts and stake the bloodsucker or listen to Willow’s insistence that the vampire was on the side of the good guys.  (To tell the truth, he was still a bit suspicious.  A vampire with a soul!  How lame a fucking story was that?)  For another, the bloodsucker was such a brainless git, it was hard to tell if he were feeling angry, envious, remorseful, or just constipated.  But the bloodsucker had invited Spike to stay, even though he had looked like he was chewing on ground glass when he had spat the words out.  It was a good thing that keeping the vampire happy wasn’t one of Spike’s goals.

The only other time Spike had ever tried to think about his past was the night that harpy Cordelia had begun snarking at him, implying that he was only pretending to have forgotten some evil deeds he had committed.  She had made it sound as if he had been some sort of mass murderer, but her rants about an ex-boyfriend cheating on her had played a disproportionately big role in the mass of innuendoes she had thrown at him.  Spike had snarled back at her, enjoying the garbled argument at first, but slowly feeling a miasma of unease engulfing him.  When Cordelia had insisted that something sinister was behind Spike’s amnesia, Willow had intervened with a comment about people in glass houses that had shut the brunette bitch up good and proper.  The witch had pulled Spike aside then and told him not to worry about it.

        “The not remembering?” he had asked.  When she had nodded, he had gone on, “The only thing that worries me is that I should be worried, Red.  The fact that I don’t give a rat’s ass about my past—is it part of this gift the bloodsucker yapped about when I first came?” The gift that the vampire seemed to think should have been his.

        “That’s not what it is,” Willow had said hurriedly.  “I mean, yes, I think it’s part of the gift, but it wasn’t a gift, Spike.”

        He had grown accustomed to her incoherent outbursts and had waited with something close to patience for her to sort out her thoughts.

        “What you got, the thing Angel talks about, it wasn’t a gift.  It was a reward.”

        She hadn’t explained further, and he hadn’t asked questions.  He had given up worrying about it almost immediately, and his mind drifted back to paths that seemed normal for him: hoping Little Ethan would be okay on Passions, calculating just how much plastic explosive he’d have to steal to take out that nest of demons on Sepulveda, wondering what Yeats had meant by “the ceremony of innocence,” worrying that Beckham would leave Manchester United to play in sodding Spain, and assessing his chances of shagging Lilah.

        He had been pretty happy, really.

        But now the expression in that pretty little blonde girl’s haunted green eyes was making him seriously wonder for the first time just who the hell he had been.   

        It had been an exhausting afternoon.  After her shock and tears over Spike had ebbed a bit, Buffy had endured another emotional scene with Angel.  They hadn’t covered much new ground, except that it was clear to her that Angel was now even more envious of Spike’s place in her heart.  Whatever that place was.  Whoever Spike was.

        Then Buffy had run into Lilah and gotten some explanations from Wesley and Cordelia about the “new arrangement” Angel had with Wolfram and Hart.  That story had gripped her heart like a cold vise.  It wasn’t bad enough that Angel and his team had walked into a serpent’s nest.  Now, apparently Willow was involved as well.  And Spike.

        And Spike.  Always, her mind kept coming back to the memory of those blue eyes blazing at her while he stood in the bright sunlight.  Looking sane and strong and handsome.  Looking like her wildest dream come true.  Except for the part where he was looking at her as if she were a stranger. 

        Buffy knocked on a door and slipped inside Willow’s room as soon as her friend answered.  She found an armchair and sunk down in it, shivering with fatigue.  Willow gave her a quick hug before moving to sit across from Buffy on the bed, her eyes intense and sympathetic.

        “You okay?” asked Willow.

        “No.  But that’s enough about me.  What are you working on?” asked Buffy.

        Willow hesitated before deciding not to push the issue. “There’s a demon that’s been killing and doing this nasty brain-sucking thing.  It lives in another dimension and travels here to LA to hunt.  Angel and the others haven’t been able to catch it because they never know where it will open a portal.”

“Let me see, what would my Willow do?” asked Buffy.  “Open a portal and go after it herself?”

“Obviously, you have observed my ways, grasshopper,” said Willow with a grin.  Then her smile faded.  “The Wolfram and Hart crowd could requisition a portal in half a minute, but I don’t trust them enough.  So I asked Spike to help me build one.”

Buffy smiled wanly.  “Do you know, Willow, the news that you don’t trust the LA Law team is the most reassuring thing I’ve heard from anyone since I got here.”

“Well, duh,” said Willow.  “If there’s anyone who knows that there are consequences to playing on the wrong side of the fence, it’s me.  I’m making sure that nothing I do magically has anything to do with them.”

“What about Spike?”  Buffy hastened to add, “I mean, how involved is he with Wolfram and Hart?”

“He doesn’t trust them either.  He said something about Shakespeare getting it right, except for not realizing dead lawyers were worse than living ones. Although they could be—” She stopped, turning bright red.

“Could be what?” asked Buffy, and then pulled up a mental image of the dead lawyer she had met earlier in the day.  She grimaced. “So, he’s chasing Lilah?”

“Well, I wouldn’t go that far,” said Willow.  “Besides, I’m sure it’s mostly just because he knows it annoys Wesley.  Not because she’s so shaggable.  That is—  I’m sure he doesn’t think—”

“It’s okay, Willow.  You don’t have to protect me.  I’m sure he does think so.”

“Well, no, I mean, she is, but that was kind of my opinion, not necessarily—”

“Shaggable?  You could have had that thought, Willow, but I can’t imagine you coming up with that word.  And I hope not doing the deed.”

“The deed?  Oh, no.  The deed hasn’t been done.  Well, not by me, or by him either.  I’m sure.  Pretty sure.”  She leaned forward, reaching out a hand in reassurance.  “He’s not in love with her or anything.  It’s just that she’s kind of there, and they’re both unattached, so when he gets bored—”  She stopped.

Buffy looked down at her hands.  “I want him away from here.  And not because I’m jealous of Lilah, or not just because of that.  I want you both away from here.”

Willow nodded.  “We need to leave.  It’s tempting to try to stay, to help Angel and the others fight themselves free of this devil’s bargain they made, but—”

“I feel it too.  The wanting to help.  But if we do that, we’ll be making the same bad choice they made.  They’re going to have to get out of this one by themselves.”

They were silent for a long moment, and finally Willow said, “I’m going to try to leave after I destroy this brain-sucking demon.  I can’t go until I manage that.”

Buffy nodded.  “Do you know how to open this portal?”

“Pretty much.”  Willow went over to the desk by the wall and picked up a book.  She walked over to the chair and sat on its arm to show a picture to Buffy.  “I need to stand in the middle of that symbol Spike was drawing for me down in the garden.  And I need some kind of talisman to open the portal.  As soon as I find that—”

But Buffy was already reaching her hand into her pocket and pulling out a piece of heavy metal stamped with an intricate design.  She held it up against the picture in Willow’s book.  The friends looked at each other and smiled wryly.

“Well, that solves both our problems pretty neatly,” said Willow.

         The strangest part was doing this at noon.  There had been daylight rituals before, but they were rare.  And Spike’s presence, noisy and unafraid as the sun’s rays struck him, made the whole thing seem unreal.

        The design he had begun to outline the day before was now scrawled across the pavement, elaborate and menacing even in the sunlight.  Willow stood in the center, her expression determined and a bit frightened.  It was just the three of them; Willow had been adamant that no one who was allied with Wolfram and Hart be near her while she was casting spells.

        “What’s the plan?” asked Buffy.  She seriously disliked the idea of anything strong and mean enough to frighten Willow coming through a portal. 

        “It’s pretty simple,” Spike was saying now.  “The witch raises the demon, and I kill it.  Think you can do your part, Red?”

        “Think you’ll be able to kill it?” asked Willow, returning the challenge.

        “Sure,” said Spike, and then added with a shrug, “Probably.  The texts say it’s vulnerable to physical force.”

        “Yeah,” said Willow in a slightly sick tone.

        “Why is that bad?” asked Buffy.  “You don’t look as happy as you should be to know this thing can be handled by the old slice and dice.”

        “It’s just that the way it was put in the text—I kinda think they were trying to say it was only susceptible to physical force.  Which means magic won’t work against it.”

        “As they say around here, whatever,” retorted Spike.  “If it doesn’t pop out here where we’re expecting it, it will show up in a few hours to grab some poor sod who has no clue and no weapon.  Are we going to do this or not?”  He positioned himself just outside the chalked design, axe in hand, legs spread apart for balance, ready to pounce on whatever appeared.

        “We’re going to do it,” said Willow firmly.  “Buffy, stand back.  You’re just a spectator, remember.”

        Buffy went to stand by the doorway to the lobby.  “Okay, but you two be careful.  Remember, you’re pulling this thing out without warning and it may be seriously annoyed.  It could be in the middle of a bath or dinner or something.”

        “Or something it would be even more pissed to be interrupted at,” suggested Spike.  His eyes blazed with the unholy joy he had always shown in a fight.

        Willow held out the talisman that Buffy had found, dropped her chin to her chest, and began to chant.  The words sounded like nonsense syllables at first, and then Buffy recognized the cadences of badly-pronounced Latin.  She recognized a word or two, and then—

        Willow threw her head back, her voice becoming deeper and louder.  There was a blast of raw power, as palpable as a strong wind or a blow to the gut.  Then the portal opened, and a very angry demon stepped through.

        The thing was huge, green and covered with spiny appendages.  Buffy jumped forward, her hand reaching automatically for a weapon.  Then she realized she had none.  You’re a spectator now, remember?

        Willow screamed something in Latin that seemed to be accomplishing nothing at all.  Buffy didn’t know if the spell itself was ineffective or if Willow’s always shaky command of that language had deserted her under the stress of the moment.  Spike dove into the fray with a more physical assault, using his axe to strike at the thing’s—were those arms, Buffy wondered? 

        Spike swung the axe with a strength that seemed somewhat more than ordinarily human to Buffy’s practiced gaze, but his blows slid off the monster’s armor.  By the third blow, he was retreating and the creature was advancing, looking more menacing and invulnerable by the moment.

        Willow flung her head back and switched to what Buffy thought was Sanskrit.  The witch’s hair started to shiver white, but the monster didn’t falter.

        Spike had finally established, through the process of elimination, that the only appendages that were really vulnerable were the thicker ones coming out of the creature’s midsection.  The last swing of his blade caused an alien scream that could reflect nothing but extreme pain.  Buffy had a moment to wonder if this were the equivalent to cutting the thing’s balls off.

        Unfortunately, pain and perhaps emasculation made the creature more dangerous.  Howling with rage, it lunged at Spike, knocking him to the ground and sending the axe sliding across the pavement, where it struck a huge container of flowering plants and sent shards of clay pottery flying.

        The axe landed directly at Buffy’s feet.

        It was a choice to pick it up, of course.  A choice to fling herself at the demon before it had a chance to flay Spike and turn on Willow.  A choice to slice off two of those grisly appendages and bury the blade deep in what she hoped was its heart.  A choice to fight and kill. 

She had no memory of thinking any of those choices through, however.  And being Buffy, there was no other choice she could make. 

As soon as she was sure the monster had stopped twitching, she tossed the axe aside and turned to make sure Spike was all right.

        He was blinking up at her, cut and bruised, but apparently not seriously harmed.    However, he was seriously annoyed.  “Bollocks!” he roared.  “You didn’t mention you were a slayer.  Could have said something.  Or joined the fight a bit sooner.”

        “Sorry,” said Buffy. 

She reached her hand down to help him up, but he ignored it, clearly still irked by her delay in entering the fray.  He stood up, turned his back on her, and looked at the demon lying on the ground.  He bent and picked up his axe. 

“What are you doing?” asked Willow.

What, Red, did you stop reading the codex as soon as you got to the part where it was killed?” said Spike.  “I need to dismember the bugger and bury the pieces separately.”

“Or what?  Will it reassemble?” asked Buffy.

“No, just spawn thousands of cockroach-like buggers that crawl in through people’s ears and eat their brains,” he said, sounding insanely cheerful. 

“Okay, that’s even higher on the ick-factor scale than I expected,” admitted Buffy.  And this is the business I just decided I had to get back into.   Dad’s descriptions of the exciting life of an insurance agent are suddenly sounding more alluring.

Spike turned and held up the axe, his previous pique apparently forgotten.  “It was your kill.  Want to do the honors?”

“No, thanks,” said Buffy.  She jumped back and retreated into the lobby as he swung the weapon and splattered demon blood everywhere.

        Buffy was climbing the main Hyperion staircase when Spike emerged from the upstairs hallway and headed down, taking the steps two at a time.  He stopped when he saw her.  “Not gone yet?” he asked.  He had showered and changed into yet another black t-shirt and a clean pair of jeans.  He looked pleased and almost relaxed.

        “No,” said Buffy.   “I need to see Willow.  Where are you going?”

        “To meet Gunn.”

        “Oh,” she said uneasily.  “What are you two up to?”

        “Some beers, buffalo wings, and a Lethal Weapon marathon.  He has all the DVDs.”

        She smiled.  “That’s nice.”

        His gaze was keen.  “You disapprove of some of this lot’s other activities, don’t you?”

        She looked down, but admitted it.  “I don’t like the idea of working with Wolfram and Hart.  No matter what terms the others think they’ve made.”

        “Yeah,” he said slowly. “Sounds like fun to sleep with the enemy.  Problem is, after a while they stop being the enemy.”

        Her throat was suddenly as dry as her eyes were moist.  “Yes,” she croaked out at last.

        “So,” he said, starting to shift down the stairs past her, “You decided you’re going to be a slayer, then?”

        “Yes,” she said again.

        “Good for you.”  He nodded and turned away, clearly eager to get away from this strange, tongue-tied creature.

        She watched him as he clattered down the stairs.  It wasn’t until he had almost reached the bottom that she noticed the figure standing in the shadows by the door.

        “Spike,” said Angel, stepping into the center of the lobby and blocking the path do the door.  “Care to give me an explanation for the mess I just found outside?”

        Spike was rolling his eyes in exasperation even before Angel had finished his sentence.  “No, because I’ve got better things to do.  Demon. Dead. Dismembered.  That good enough?”

        “No, that’s not good enough,” raged Angel, all semblance of calm disappearing the moment Spike opened his mouth.  “What did you do to my garden?”

        “Sod the bloody garden right now!”

        “That’s the problem.  It is a bloody garden—there are demon guts all over the place!  It looks and smells like an abattoir.”

        “So?”  Spike’s tone was infuriatingly reasonable.  “What’s your complaint?  I’d think that would be a bloodsucker’s ideal home makeover.  Surprised you haven’t had the Trading Spaces crowd over in hopes they’d drape entrails around the place.”

 Spike had been trying to edge around Angel and out the door, but his progress was blocked again.  The vampire was leaning forward and gesturing dramatically with one outthrust hand and pointing finger.  “I do not care to have my home looking like that!”

        Spike gave a long-suffering sigh.  “Look, mate, I know cheering up isn’t an option for you, but you can sodding well ease up.  Some of us like to celebrate after a fight.  Me and that little girl on the stairs killed a demon this afternoon, and I’m bloody well going to have a good time tonight, even if no one else does.”

        Angel raised his eyes to Buffy’s for a moment, then looked away, his lips tightening.  Spike’s reference to her seemed to fuel his rage.  “And that’s another thing,” he ranted.  “Why didn’t you and Willow tell me what you were up to?  I had a right to know.  And I could have helped.  You two don’t exactly seem to be working as part of our team here.”

        That made Spike angry at last.  His tone was bitter and sarcastic as he spat out, “Thanks, mate, but the last time I checked, you weren’t my father, so I don’t have to ask for your help or your permission.   I do what I decide, not what some bloodsucker wants.  And the same goes for Willow.” 

“This is my place—”  Angel ground the words out between his teeth.

“Bollocks.  The witch and I earn our keep.  And I’ll clean your precious garden tomorrow.”  Spike brushed past Angel and out the door of the hotel without so much as a backwards glance at Buffy.

        Angel stared up at Buffy for a long moment.  She sighed and shrugged, turned her back on him, and went to find Willow.

        “We need to get him away from here,” Buffy said to Willow. “If he stays, he’ll get pulled into that mess with Wolfram and Hart.  Spike didn’t earn his soul and his humanity to turn around and put them at risk in a battle that isn’t his.” 

        “No,” agreed Willow.  She looked up from her chair by the desk, her expression grave as she watched Buffy pace nervously.  “They don’t really want him anyway.  They won’t kick him out because he’s a good fighter and because Angel would feel guilty doing that.  But mostly they’ve just put up with him because I’m around and I insisted.  Angel would be happy, well, not happy, because he never is and that’s not a good thing anyway, but Angel would prefer it if Spike left.”

“I’m sure he would,” said Buffy, grimacing.  “And after today, I can hardly blame him.  Spike still ranks pretty high on the annoyance scale. And that adds to another problem.  Too many people here know Spike, and sooner or later someone is going to get mad and say something about his past that will get through even his thick skull.  And the way he is now, he won’t be able to understand everything that happened to him. But I don’t like the idea of him wandering around, literally without a friend in the world.”  She turned to Willow and leaned forward, her eyes pleading.  “I know you’re planning on leaving.  Can you think of a way to get him to come with you?  Is there something you have to do that he could help you with?  Because if he thought he was helping . . .”

        “Well—” said Willow slowly . . .

         “You want to be Dumbledore?” asked Spike.  He tossed aside the broom he’d been using to clean up the garden and stared at Willow incredulously.

        “I do not!” she said indignantly.  “Giles is Dumbledore.  My friend.  He’s this ex-Watcher who is going to help me start the school.  I’m Professor McGonnagal.  I can even turn into a cat if necessary.  I just don’t want to, because there’s a sad story in my past regarding a cat and a crossbow that I won’t go into right now.  But I can do this school thing.  I’m powerful enough to keep even a passel of giggly, naughty slayerettes in check.  Lots of slayerettes. Giles keeps finding more and more of them who need a good home and training.  But I can’t teach them all by myself.”

        “And you want me to teach them to fight?”  She thought that he seemed intrigued by the idea.  He came to sit down on the bench beside her, giving her his full attention.

        “No.  I mean, yes, but more than that.  You know lots and lots about demons.  All kinds of demons.  What they’re like, what they want, how they live, how they kill, and how to kill them.  Slayers need to learn that.”

        “I could do that,” he admitted.  He started to say something, changed his mind, and finally burst out with, “Just one thing you need to tell me first, Red.”

        “What’s that?”  Willow frowned in response to his unusually serious tone.

        “That girl with the silly name.  Buffy.  What did I do to her?  Before.  There must have been something.”

        She hesitated.  He had a right to know at least part of it.  She picked the most important thing.  “You helped her save the world.”  She felt no guilt for not telling him more.  Her own past haunted her too much for her to underestimate the value of the reward Spike had earned.

        “Oh.”  She saw the anxiety flee from his eyes as he accepted the sincerity of her tone.  “That’s all right then,” he said.

        His gaze was unfocused for a moment, and she knew that the last part of the conversation was fading from his memory, as all discussions of his previous life inevitably did.  Then he seemed to tense again, this time with the nervous energy that was so typical of him.  Now, he was concentrating entirely on the present and future.  “So, witch, where’s this school we’re going to start?” he asked eagerly.

        “Did he agree?” asked Buffy.

        Willow nodded.  She gazed into her friend’s face, but Buffy stood deep in the shadows of the foyer, and her expression was hard to read.

        “I think he liked the idea,” said Willow.  “Even though he found the thought of being a teacher pretty funny.  I was afraid there wouldn’t be enough excitement and violence in it for him, but he said it was a chance to build something.  And that he’d been thinking about building things instead of always blowing them up or knocking them down.”

        “Good.”  Buffy sounded relieved.

        “You could come too,” said Willow hesitantly.  “No one has more to teach slayers than you.”

        “Oh, no,” said Buffy emphatically.  “I had enough of lecturing trainees last year, and frankly I sucked at it.  Almost lost the battle and the world with my great speechifying skills.”  Her voice leveled out, and a note of longing entered it even as she said, “Besides, if I was there, he would keep wondering who I was and what we had done together.  He might even start remembering.  That wouldn’t be fair to him.  It’s not what I want—for him.”  She gave Willow a hug and turned towards the door.   “Good-bye. I’m still not sure what I’m going to do next, but I’ll make sure you always have my phone number and email.”

        “Aren’t—aren’t you going to say good-bye to him?” asked Willow.

        “No,” said Buffy, stopping for a moment, but not turning around.  “He won’t expect it.  We don’t know each other well enough for that.”  She took another step, then paused again.  “Take care of him for me, Will.”

        “I promise,” said Willow.

        There will be a sequel to this eventually, because I just can’t leave these characters alone.  Besides, Sisabet asked for a Willow-runs-Hogwarts fic, and even though she probably didn’t mean it, she should know better than to put ideas in my head.