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Yes, been a while, hasn't it? Ah well. I've been *crafting*! And flaking out in front of the fan. OMGhot. Yuck.
Tomorrow we're going to a wedding in a distant land. Kansas, actually. Heh. Won't be home until Sunday sometime, so no worries if i don't reply to a comment or something... I can only hope the cats won't be sick everywhere for me to deal with when we get home. Gah.
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ladycat777 asked for prompts for comment-fic. Yay! Mine's too big for the comments - wheeee! So you can read it here. Lovely stuff!
I'm still firmly a Spander-fan, but i'm enjoying the hell out of Supernatural, as well...pondering a crossover - what'cha think, flist? :)
Okay, okay - on with the fic! I'm sure i had other stuff to pimp/link/whatever, but i'm all dazed by the heat and my dead-pig dinner. Thank you thank you,reremouse for the look-see's and such! You rock. Enjoy!
Previous parts here.
Oh! I wanted to say, also - i recently went through the tedious and onorous task of deleting a lot of my memories so they're all just my own personal fic, now. Except for fic written for me and some...others and one really big entry i'll tackle...later. When my hands are'nt numb, jayzus.
*kicks lj*
Just thought i'd mention it.
"Kitty, kitty, kitty... Wake up, little kitty..." Something cool and wet, on his face - his lips - and Xander jerked away, gasping. Drusilla leaned over him, her wet hair dripping water onto his face. "Do you want a nice bowl of milk, kitty-kitty?"
"Don't," Xander said. Tried to say. His mouth was dry and his shoulders and chest ached - a bone-deep throb of muscles strained too long in one position. His wrists inside the cuffs were killing him - they felt raw, like they were bleeding, although he was pretty sure Dru or Spike would have said something. Done...something. Xander shuddered. Shuddered again when Dru's fingers slid down his cheek and cupped his jaw - made him look up.
"Spike says you have to eat, kitty. I thought bread and milk but Spike says kitties like meat."
"Spike can go fuck himself and you can, too," Xander grated out. His throat was raw and his voice was hoarse and *God, oh god, just go the fuck away, go away and leave me alone, leave me alone, I don't care -*
"Don't use that sort of language in front of my girl," Spike said, sliding in from nowhere, water in silver trails over his chest. He took a lot of baths.
"Fuck off," Xander muttered, and Spike reached down and hauled Xander up by his shirt-front, tearing it a little more. Jerking Xander much, much too close to naked vampire bodies.
"Don't be a smart-ass, Xander," Spike purred, his lips just brushing Xander's ear. He pushed at Xander's hair with his nose, nuzzling and snuffling a little, moving down and Xander tried to jerk away. "Stand still."
Dru pressed up against Xander's front, her arms going around his waist. Her hands, warmed from the water, circled Xander's wrists and squeezed hard. Xander froze, panting. "Don't make Spike angry, kitty." Dru's eyes glittered in the candle light, a deep, velvety brown. "You know what happens."
"I - know." That knowledge made Xander shiver all over, his breath coming out in a shocky little gasp. "Spike, just - don't, okay? Just -"
"Be quiet, little kitty, or I'll have to muzzle you." Spike's eyes were bright with sardonic amusement and Xander looked away into the golden haze of candles and the low, slanting light of sunset. Tried hard not to feel Spike's naked body pressed solidly against him from shoulder to thigh. Tried not to feel Dru's lips, kissing their way slowly over his collarbone to her 'favorite' spot.
*Can't take this, can't do this...so fucking stupid, so fucking - god, no, no, no -* "No," Xander whispered, but their fangs sank in anyway, twin sets of ivory needles. The rush - the sudden, heart-tripping heat of it made him moan softly and he barely noticed when they finished. When Dru and then Spike pulled away and eased him back down onto the floor. Spike's fingers were at his lips, pressing something between them and Xander felt the pill roll onto his tongue - swallowed the tequila that followed. It was swallow or choke, and Xander didn't want to cough, just now. Not the way his ribs were aching.
Xander rolled onto his side, wincing at the pressure on his arm. Spike was still crouched right there, his elbows tucked back against his sides and his hands on his knees. "Go 'way, Spike."
"Pretty soon," Spike said. He ran his hands back over his skull, an odd look on his face. Dru had tried to comb his hair out but it had been too matted and they'd ended up clipping it all off. Now Spike's hair was an inch-long brush of light brown. Nothing like his bleached-blond Sunnydale days. Xander thought he looked like a gladiator.
*The kind that killed the Christians. The crowd'd love him...he'd always draw first blood...send the lions running...*
"Getting better in here."
Xander jerked a little, startled. He'd managed to almost completely tune Spike out. "Huh?"
"I said, it's getting better. In here." Spike tapped his temple. "They're fading away, those...others. Like they should. Nothing but shades, anyway. Shades and shadows..." Spike ran his hand back over his skull again, slowly. Looking into some middle distance, his eyes dark. "Don't know how she did it, Xander. Don't know how she...knew." Spike's focus shortened until he was looking at Xander again, summer-blue eyes dilated with drug - with blood. Like Xander's were, he knew. Xander blinked, sinking toward that half-sleep state they mostly kept him in.
*Oxycontin and blood-loss, unbeatable combo. Why didn't I think of this before? Jesus,fight it -*
"She made it like...it all never happened. My leg...and..." Spike's hand went to his chest, absently rubbing, and Xander shut his eyes.
He'd had scars there once. They were gone now, too. *Just like his soul. No soul, no...scars. No love.*
"No, kitty. We love. Would have thought you'd have learned that by now." Xander opened his eyes wide, fighting the drug. Spike was looking oddly at him, a little grin on his face. "You didn't say that out loud."
"J-Jesus, Spike, wh-what -?"
Spike gestured with his chin toward Dru, who was fastening up the bodice of an old-fashioned looking dress. It was ragged around the hem and the ends of the sleeves. "It's her, you know. Her blood in the spell. Gave me...something."
"So you're...nuts now...too?" Xander asked, sluggish, and Spike laughed softly.
"Nah. Just - a little touched. But it's true, you know. I ache with it, Xander. With love. For her...for - others."
"Don't call me...that."
"Why not?"
"Not mmm...my friend," Xander slurred. His eyelids were too heavy to hold open anymore and he let them close. Let the world - his house - slip away into spangled darkness.
"Dunno what I am," Spike said, his voice slipping sideways into the black. Last sliver of light, blue-white and shimmering. And then Xander sank, and all the light was gone.
When he woke up, he was upstairs. Wrapped in the quilt from his bed, propped on pillows in front of a purring fire. The handcuffs were gone. Xander lay there, staring at the bed of embers under the half-consumed logs. They seemed to ripple with the heat, like a slowly undulating snake. He could feel - he knew... The house was empty. Spike and Dru were gone. The sky through the window was navy and deep violet, the sun only down an hour, at the most. There was a bottle of tequila by him and he pushed himself slowly up onto his elbow - uncapped it and took a long drink. As he lowered the bottle back to the floor, he saw the bruises around his wrist. Plum, blue - rot-green and sickly yellow. As he stared, the yellow faded and the green yellowed, all of it becoming...lighter. Fading. Leaving...nothing. Xander swallowed hard but he knew he was going to be sick.
He grabbed Spike's foot-soaking tub - sitting right there next to the bottle - and gagged up tequila and bile until his stomach hurt. He flopped back on the pillows, panting. Feeling tears oozing out from the corners of his eyes and not even caring. Not thinking for even one minute why the tub had been there, or the bottle.
*Hate you, Spike, you fucker, you bastard, you fucking undead god damn monster, why did you...why couldn't you... Fucking hate you.*
Over the next five months, Xander managed to keep himself mostly drunk at all times. It wasn't much of an effort. He finished off his Oxycontin, too, and got a refill but mostly only looked at them. He didn't like the fuzziness. He wanted things to stay...clear. Diamond-bright. Drinking made it all like crystal, with an edge like a razor.
He spent a lot of time staring in the mirror, looking for the scars from Dru's mouth and Spike's. There weren't any, though, and it made him wonder if he'd dreamed it all. Except...there was a circle of scorched wood downstairs in the empty formal dining room, and he'd go and sit in the middle sometimes. Remembering when he was the heart, once.
*Can't be the heart when you've lost yours. Or maybe I've lost my soul...maybe that's why Drusilla could come right in. Giles said a vamp doesn't need an invite into another demon's...lair. So maybe I'm just a soulless thing now. Sitting in my lair.* Xander laughed softly and stood up, the bottle in his hand thumping on the floor. Flakes of char broke away, sticking to the glass.
His phone was ringing upstairs - he could hear it. He knew it was Giles. He'd picked up once, back in...January. Something about sending some Slayers - something about him moving on. Something about life. He'd told Giles he really wasn't up to having one, right then. Call back later, maybe.
*Like in a couple hundred years. Maybe I'll feel like... Maybe I'll feel, then.* He wasn't sure how despair, bitterness - grief - weren't a vulnerability. Maybe you could only truly be hurt when you were happy. Maybe the heart-enlarging effects of love and joy and singing on Christmas morning even if the roast beast was gone was the reason your heart shattered when the other shoe...kicked it. *You're so fucking drunk...you don't even know...*
"Don't know a bloody thing, do you, Harris?"
"Did I say that out loud?" Xander asked, turning slowly, and Spike smirked at him from the door.
"What do you think?" Spike asked, and pushed away from the jamb. Sauntered over to Xander and he was Spike again. Not the wreck of bone and skin and bitterness from October - not the too-quiet man who'd ducked his head and stepped aside in the last days of Sunnydale. But the man - vampire - he'd been years ago, before an invisible choke-chain and a broken heart. This was the Spike who'd promised Buffy that she would die in four days and Xander felt a prickle of fear scuttle up his back.
"I think... Where's Drusilla?"
Spike's expression altered a little, his amused look fading to something like bewilderment for a moment. "She's off chasing rainbows, she is." Spike stopped just where the charred wood started - scuffed at it with his toe. Xander just stood there, watching him. A little dizzy, a lot exhausted. Sick to death.
"Got some proper drink, then?" Spike asked, jerking his chin upwards and Xander nodded.
"Got enough to get a vampire drunk," Xander replied, and lifted his own bottle to his lips, gulping. Raw burn and heat and that little flushing rush. Close to what it had felt like when...heat, hurt, it all goes away...
"Missed me, did you?" Spike asked, suddenly much too close and much too real - lips and eyes and smoldering cigarette right there.
Xander blinked and took a step back. "You started smoking again."
Spike lifted his cigarette and took a drag, watching Xander. The little smile was back. "Yeah. Bothered me before. Hurt my throat - made me 'bout fucking strangle. Bloody stupid."
"Don't set anything on fire," Xander said, and jerked himself away from that steady - unsteadying - regard. He led Spike upstairs and grabbed a bottle of Jack from the kitchen - tossed it over and went to the fireplace. The April nights were chilly and he'd had a fire burning since November, it seemed. It was almost like having someone there, a fire was. It talked in its own secret language and Xander found he turned the TV off more and more and just sat, listening to the hissing, popping rush of it.
Now he leaned one shoulder against the stone of the surround and watched Spike prowl from point to point, touching things here and there. A restless cat, dissatisfied, until he found his journal lying in state on the small table under the window. He put the bottle down and touched the cover of the journal with careful fingertips, looking over at Xander finally, that scarred eyebrow going up in a move that was...
*Just like then, hasn't changed...isn't the same...*
"Why'd you keep it?"
Xander shrugged - took another drink. "I dunno. I just... It was different. *It was you. It was my last link with...older things. It's like something Giles would do or Willow, it's...*
"Regret," Spike said softly, and Xander nodded. Regret. Exactly. Spike lifted the journal and undid the bindings on it - began to leaf through it, walking slowly toward Xander. Xander took another drink, watching him.
Spike shook his head, laughing softly. "This is worse than that bloody idiot Castaneda. What babble." Spike touched a page of words that seemed to have been written in blood. Xander wondered if it had been his own, or someone else's.
"All mine, mate. No worries there."
"That's really freaking me out, man."
Spike's gaze darted up to Xander's, a flashing glance of amusement and glee. "Doesn't work on everybody. Thank Christ - can you imagine the inane prattle I'd be forced to listen to in clubs? No..." Spike crouched down, leafing to the very end of the journal and staring for a long moment at the sketch of the dead woman. "It only works sometimes." He reached out and settled the journal on the burning logs, balancing it carefully. The tattered edges of the clippings fluttered in the heat and then began to curl and blacken. Spike rubbed his hand on his thigh and stood up.
Xander stared down at the fire - at the journal. At the death-locked stare of the woman, watching her flayed skin and the bright skein of blood under her jaw blacken and crumble. "So - what makes it work?"
"Not sure, really," Spike said. He sent his cigarette butt after the journal and then turned to Xander, toe to toe, nearly touching. "I just know it has to be someone...special."
"Special how?" Xander asked.
"Shut up," Spike whispered. He leaned forward the few inches between them, his eyes going half-lidded and dark. Drawing in a long breath through his mouth, his fingers curling slowly around Xander's wrists. Xander felt the bottle slip out of his hand - bump knee and shin and clunk unharmed to the wooden floor, rolling away. Leaving an arc of liquid behind as it rolled, golden with reflected flame.
It hurt like it had the first time, lying under mosquito netting and a black-haired South African boy, biting his lip until it bled. Evan had stopped instantly, letting out a small sound of distress - waiting while Xander pried his hands open, nails sunk into Evan's skin. Waited for it to be good again.
Spike only pushed harder, his head dipping down and his tongue - cool and agile - slipping along Xander's lip, gathering the blood into his own mouth. Sucking gently while Xander struggled fruitlessly under him and then gave up, panting.
"Sspike -"
"Push against me," Spike murmured, his tongue busy elsewhere now and Xander pushed, legs trembling. Pushed and gasped in a hard, hitching breath as Spike breached him fully - slid in. Hot rush of cool flesh, the burn going up the backs of Xander's legs and twisting into his belly - plucking at his balls.
"Christ, that's lovely..." Spike said, breathy whisper in Xander's ear, his forearms under Xander's shoulders, his fingers tight in Xander's hair. Straining his head back, chin to the ceiling and Spike's mouth lapping and nibbling and sucking here, there, there.
Xander shuddered, groaning softly - dug his heel into the back of Spike's thigh and pushed, pushed, pushed - lifted his hips and dragged his hands down Spike's back, fingernails catching on every swell of vertebrae. "Spike - Jesus -" Spike's shoulder was right there, curve of skin that glowed in the firelight like mother of pearl. Finer than a human's skin - poreless and perfect and Xander craned his head down and bit, hard.
"Fuck - yeah..." Spike's hips jerked forward and Xander's whole body locked tight as he rode the wave of burning, shuddering ache.
"Just - lemme - Spike, wait -" Xander clawed at Spike's back but Spike only arched like a Halloween tom, his gaze meeting Xander's all pumpkin-gold and feral, lips snarling back from needle-pointed fangs.
"Too late," Spike growled, lifting and pulling and then pushing back in, harder and faster and twist of hips right there, right there and Xander sucked in oxygen gone rare and bright-edged, keening. There was an oval of red on Spike's perfect shoulder and Xander focused on it - traced the indentations of his teeth and let his hands slide lower - let them cup and then squeeze the dense, flexing muscle.
"Why'd you - c-come back?" Xander asked, and Spike tugged at his hair - pushed Xander's chin up again with a nudge of his cheek.
"Junkie, aren't I? Can't get enough." Spike's voice was amused - slightly breathless - and his fangs slid in easily, two slim wands of burning ice. The fire was white-gold-scarlet in the edges of Xander's vision, dancing and growing as he opened wide - eyes, mouth, thighs - to Spike. As he shuddered, spitted and arched and writhing, to a bone-wringing orgasm.
When the room blinked back from nuclear-white to saffron-glow and the low murmur of the fire, Spike was still on him - in him. Moving with the slow undulation of a snake, heavy and cool and totally inescapable. Xander's legs were sprawled, bent and heavy and too weak to move. Xander let his head roll to the side as Spike lapped at his throat, thorough cleaning of a mother cat.
"M'not a cat," Spike grumbled.
"What's that?" Xander asked, letting his hand slide off Spike's back and flop limply on the floor. Flopped in the general direction of the slim, silver flask that was slipping out of Spike's coat pocket.
"Mmm? Oh. That's something Dru made up, just for you." Spike shifted, pushing himself up - kneeling back, shifting Xander's hips up onto his thighs. "Hold on, now, Xander. Hold tight."
Xander flexed his hips and thighs, watching Spike's eyes flutter, his head going back. Spike grinned down at him, all curious angles and planes - red between his fangs. "Thought Dru left."
"Eventually," Spike said. He stretched for the flask and Xander sighed, his own eyes closing at the press and rub of Spike's cock on sensitized flesh. "But not before she left me this little...aperitif, you might say."
"I doubt I'd say it."
Spike ignored him - unscrewed the lid and took a delicate sniff. Then he put his hand around the back of Xander's neck and hauled him upright, settling him onto cock and thighs with casual strength. Xander whimpered, bracing his forearms on Spike's shoulders, his head heavy on his neck.
"What the - fuck -"
"Just a little something from her to you. Drink up, now."
The flask's edge was cool and it tasted of iron and Xander ducked away, grimacing. Spike's fingers dug in on either side of his spine, pinching hard and Xander arched away from the stabbing pain and then froze as Spike shook him a little.
"Don't fucking fight me, Xander. Drink it. Won't hurt you."
Xander batted weakly at the flask - yelped when Spike pinched even harder, everything going blood-red for a moment as needling heat raced down his spine. And through his cock. *Fuck, fuck - oh god, that's - fucking sick it's - good, so damn -*
"Always knew you were a kinky bugger," Spike murmured, his voice delighted and a little cracked and Xander ground their bodies together, gasping for air.
"Don't, just - Spike -"
"Drink it." Spike pushed the flask against Xander's mouth again, tipping it, and fluid spilled out and sluiced into Xander's mouth. Thick and cold and slippery, tasting of vinegar and salt and citrus. Tasting of earth and rot and Xander tried to gag - tried to spit it out. But Spike's hand was on his chin now, holding his mouth shut. Arm around his back and fingertips just stroking his throat and Xander twisted and choked and swallowed, shuddering. The fluid snaked down his throat and into his belly and he could feel it uncoiling there, like a knot of worms going free. Spike let his chin go and Xander worked his tongue through the dregs.
"What the - what the fuck - god -"
"Oh, good, good kitty." Spike looked delighted. He pushed Xander over with a thump, following him down and getting one of Xander's thighs up over his shoulder, spreading Xander wide under him - crushing him small. "That was bloody marvelous, I could feel you -"
"Shut up, Spike." Xander couldn't seem to make his hands work - his arms. He lay like a ragdoll, watching Spike rock over him, the firelight flickering and dimming as if the fire were guttering out. "What'd you - what's it d-doing? What -"
"Just killing you, Xander, that's all. Just a poison Dru found. Bane and blackest magic to gut that bloody baba yaga's spell."
Xander writhed mutely, the icy worms creeping out and out from his gut - invading every limb. Constricting around his spine and lungs and heart. He could hear his breathe wheezing in his throat - could feel his fingers and toes curling tight. When Spike's wrist, gashed with scarlet, was pressed to his mouth he couldn't fight - couldn't move. He felt Spike's fingers stroking again, over and over so that he swallowed. Spike's blood tasted like woodsmoke and honey.
"Just swallow it down, then. Just a little medicine to make you all better." Spike's eyes seemed to glow - grow - bright as the sun. Hammered gold slitted with black, and Xander felt himself falling into that black. Felt, distantly, Spike moving in him again, faster and harder. He tried to stop his gliding drop into that vast darkness but his fingers were numb and useless - his lungs breathless. "All better," Spike crooned softly, and Xander felt Spike's tongue at the corner of his mouth as Spike's wrist slipped away. "Spoonful of sugar soon, then you'll be right as rain."
*Rain, rain, go away...can you hear me, Spike?*
"I hear you. Shhh...go to sleep." Xander tried to shake his head but he couldn't feel himself anymore - couldn't see, couldn't hear. Sleep...seemed like the best thing, and he let it come. It was cold.
ETA: Uh, guys. By 'crafting' i meant serious working on the fic! Not bird houses made out of popsicle sticks. Just thought i'd...clear that up.
*cough*
Continued here.
Tomorrow we're going to a wedding in a distant land. Kansas, actually. Heh. Won't be home until Sunday sometime, so no worries if i don't reply to a comment or something... I can only hope the cats won't be sick everywhere for me to deal with when we get home. Gah.
ladycat777 asked for prompts for comment-fic. Yay! Mine's too big for the comments - wheeee! So you can read it here. Lovely stuff!I'm still firmly a Spander-fan, but i'm enjoying the hell out of Supernatural, as well...pondering a crossover - what'cha think, flist? :)
Okay, okay - on with the fic! I'm sure i had other stuff to pimp/link/whatever, but i'm all dazed by the heat and my dead-pig dinner. Thank you thank you,
reremouse for the look-see's and such! You rock. Enjoy!Previous parts here.
Oh! I wanted to say, also - i recently went through the tedious and onorous task of deleting a lot of my memories so they're all just my own personal fic, now. Except for fic written for me and some...others and one really big entry i'll tackle...later. When my hands are'nt numb, jayzus.
*kicks lj*
Just thought i'd mention it.
"Kitty, kitty, kitty... Wake up, little kitty..." Something cool and wet, on his face - his lips - and Xander jerked away, gasping. Drusilla leaned over him, her wet hair dripping water onto his face. "Do you want a nice bowl of milk, kitty-kitty?"
"Don't," Xander said. Tried to say. His mouth was dry and his shoulders and chest ached - a bone-deep throb of muscles strained too long in one position. His wrists inside the cuffs were killing him - they felt raw, like they were bleeding, although he was pretty sure Dru or Spike would have said something. Done...something. Xander shuddered. Shuddered again when Dru's fingers slid down his cheek and cupped his jaw - made him look up.
"Spike says you have to eat, kitty. I thought bread and milk but Spike says kitties like meat."
"Spike can go fuck himself and you can, too," Xander grated out. His throat was raw and his voice was hoarse and *God, oh god, just go the fuck away, go away and leave me alone, leave me alone, I don't care -*
"Don't use that sort of language in front of my girl," Spike said, sliding in from nowhere, water in silver trails over his chest. He took a lot of baths.
"Fuck off," Xander muttered, and Spike reached down and hauled Xander up by his shirt-front, tearing it a little more. Jerking Xander much, much too close to naked vampire bodies.
"Don't be a smart-ass, Xander," Spike purred, his lips just brushing Xander's ear. He pushed at Xander's hair with his nose, nuzzling and snuffling a little, moving down and Xander tried to jerk away. "Stand still."
Dru pressed up against Xander's front, her arms going around his waist. Her hands, warmed from the water, circled Xander's wrists and squeezed hard. Xander froze, panting. "Don't make Spike angry, kitty." Dru's eyes glittered in the candle light, a deep, velvety brown. "You know what happens."
"I - know." That knowledge made Xander shiver all over, his breath coming out in a shocky little gasp. "Spike, just - don't, okay? Just -"
"Be quiet, little kitty, or I'll have to muzzle you." Spike's eyes were bright with sardonic amusement and Xander looked away into the golden haze of candles and the low, slanting light of sunset. Tried hard not to feel Spike's naked body pressed solidly against him from shoulder to thigh. Tried not to feel Dru's lips, kissing their way slowly over his collarbone to her 'favorite' spot.
*Can't take this, can't do this...so fucking stupid, so fucking - god, no, no, no -* "No," Xander whispered, but their fangs sank in anyway, twin sets of ivory needles. The rush - the sudden, heart-tripping heat of it made him moan softly and he barely noticed when they finished. When Dru and then Spike pulled away and eased him back down onto the floor. Spike's fingers were at his lips, pressing something between them and Xander felt the pill roll onto his tongue - swallowed the tequila that followed. It was swallow or choke, and Xander didn't want to cough, just now. Not the way his ribs were aching.
Xander rolled onto his side, wincing at the pressure on his arm. Spike was still crouched right there, his elbows tucked back against his sides and his hands on his knees. "Go 'way, Spike."
"Pretty soon," Spike said. He ran his hands back over his skull, an odd look on his face. Dru had tried to comb his hair out but it had been too matted and they'd ended up clipping it all off. Now Spike's hair was an inch-long brush of light brown. Nothing like his bleached-blond Sunnydale days. Xander thought he looked like a gladiator.
*The kind that killed the Christians. The crowd'd love him...he'd always draw first blood...send the lions running...*
"Getting better in here."
Xander jerked a little, startled. He'd managed to almost completely tune Spike out. "Huh?"
"I said, it's getting better. In here." Spike tapped his temple. "They're fading away, those...others. Like they should. Nothing but shades, anyway. Shades and shadows..." Spike ran his hand back over his skull again, slowly. Looking into some middle distance, his eyes dark. "Don't know how she did it, Xander. Don't know how she...knew." Spike's focus shortened until he was looking at Xander again, summer-blue eyes dilated with drug - with blood. Like Xander's were, he knew. Xander blinked, sinking toward that half-sleep state they mostly kept him in.
*Oxycontin and blood-loss, unbeatable combo. Why didn't I think of this before? Jesus,fight it -*
"She made it like...it all never happened. My leg...and..." Spike's hand went to his chest, absently rubbing, and Xander shut his eyes.
He'd had scars there once. They were gone now, too. *Just like his soul. No soul, no...scars. No love.*
"No, kitty. We love. Would have thought you'd have learned that by now." Xander opened his eyes wide, fighting the drug. Spike was looking oddly at him, a little grin on his face. "You didn't say that out loud."
"J-Jesus, Spike, wh-what -?"
Spike gestured with his chin toward Dru, who was fastening up the bodice of an old-fashioned looking dress. It was ragged around the hem and the ends of the sleeves. "It's her, you know. Her blood in the spell. Gave me...something."
"So you're...nuts now...too?" Xander asked, sluggish, and Spike laughed softly.
"Nah. Just - a little touched. But it's true, you know. I ache with it, Xander. With love. For her...for - others."
"Don't call me...that."
"Why not?"
"Not mmm...my friend," Xander slurred. His eyelids were too heavy to hold open anymore and he let them close. Let the world - his house - slip away into spangled darkness.
"Dunno what I am," Spike said, his voice slipping sideways into the black. Last sliver of light, blue-white and shimmering. And then Xander sank, and all the light was gone.
When he woke up, he was upstairs. Wrapped in the quilt from his bed, propped on pillows in front of a purring fire. The handcuffs were gone. Xander lay there, staring at the bed of embers under the half-consumed logs. They seemed to ripple with the heat, like a slowly undulating snake. He could feel - he knew... The house was empty. Spike and Dru were gone. The sky through the window was navy and deep violet, the sun only down an hour, at the most. There was a bottle of tequila by him and he pushed himself slowly up onto his elbow - uncapped it and took a long drink. As he lowered the bottle back to the floor, he saw the bruises around his wrist. Plum, blue - rot-green and sickly yellow. As he stared, the yellow faded and the green yellowed, all of it becoming...lighter. Fading. Leaving...nothing. Xander swallowed hard but he knew he was going to be sick.
He grabbed Spike's foot-soaking tub - sitting right there next to the bottle - and gagged up tequila and bile until his stomach hurt. He flopped back on the pillows, panting. Feeling tears oozing out from the corners of his eyes and not even caring. Not thinking for even one minute why the tub had been there, or the bottle.
*Hate you, Spike, you fucker, you bastard, you fucking undead god damn monster, why did you...why couldn't you... Fucking hate you.*
Over the next five months, Xander managed to keep himself mostly drunk at all times. It wasn't much of an effort. He finished off his Oxycontin, too, and got a refill but mostly only looked at them. He didn't like the fuzziness. He wanted things to stay...clear. Diamond-bright. Drinking made it all like crystal, with an edge like a razor.
He spent a lot of time staring in the mirror, looking for the scars from Dru's mouth and Spike's. There weren't any, though, and it made him wonder if he'd dreamed it all. Except...there was a circle of scorched wood downstairs in the empty formal dining room, and he'd go and sit in the middle sometimes. Remembering when he was the heart, once.
*Can't be the heart when you've lost yours. Or maybe I've lost my soul...maybe that's why Drusilla could come right in. Giles said a vamp doesn't need an invite into another demon's...lair. So maybe I'm just a soulless thing now. Sitting in my lair.* Xander laughed softly and stood up, the bottle in his hand thumping on the floor. Flakes of char broke away, sticking to the glass.
His phone was ringing upstairs - he could hear it. He knew it was Giles. He'd picked up once, back in...January. Something about sending some Slayers - something about him moving on. Something about life. He'd told Giles he really wasn't up to having one, right then. Call back later, maybe.
*Like in a couple hundred years. Maybe I'll feel like... Maybe I'll feel, then.* He wasn't sure how despair, bitterness - grief - weren't a vulnerability. Maybe you could only truly be hurt when you were happy. Maybe the heart-enlarging effects of love and joy and singing on Christmas morning even if the roast beast was gone was the reason your heart shattered when the other shoe...kicked it. *You're so fucking drunk...you don't even know...*
"Don't know a bloody thing, do you, Harris?"
"Did I say that out loud?" Xander asked, turning slowly, and Spike smirked at him from the door.
"What do you think?" Spike asked, and pushed away from the jamb. Sauntered over to Xander and he was Spike again. Not the wreck of bone and skin and bitterness from October - not the too-quiet man who'd ducked his head and stepped aside in the last days of Sunnydale. But the man - vampire - he'd been years ago, before an invisible choke-chain and a broken heart. This was the Spike who'd promised Buffy that she would die in four days and Xander felt a prickle of fear scuttle up his back.
"I think... Where's Drusilla?"
Spike's expression altered a little, his amused look fading to something like bewilderment for a moment. "She's off chasing rainbows, she is." Spike stopped just where the charred wood started - scuffed at it with his toe. Xander just stood there, watching him. A little dizzy, a lot exhausted. Sick to death.
"Got some proper drink, then?" Spike asked, jerking his chin upwards and Xander nodded.
"Got enough to get a vampire drunk," Xander replied, and lifted his own bottle to his lips, gulping. Raw burn and heat and that little flushing rush. Close to what it had felt like when...heat, hurt, it all goes away...
"Missed me, did you?" Spike asked, suddenly much too close and much too real - lips and eyes and smoldering cigarette right there.
Xander blinked and took a step back. "You started smoking again."
Spike lifted his cigarette and took a drag, watching Xander. The little smile was back. "Yeah. Bothered me before. Hurt my throat - made me 'bout fucking strangle. Bloody stupid."
"Don't set anything on fire," Xander said, and jerked himself away from that steady - unsteadying - regard. He led Spike upstairs and grabbed a bottle of Jack from the kitchen - tossed it over and went to the fireplace. The April nights were chilly and he'd had a fire burning since November, it seemed. It was almost like having someone there, a fire was. It talked in its own secret language and Xander found he turned the TV off more and more and just sat, listening to the hissing, popping rush of it.
Now he leaned one shoulder against the stone of the surround and watched Spike prowl from point to point, touching things here and there. A restless cat, dissatisfied, until he found his journal lying in state on the small table under the window. He put the bottle down and touched the cover of the journal with careful fingertips, looking over at Xander finally, that scarred eyebrow going up in a move that was...
*Just like then, hasn't changed...isn't the same...*
"Why'd you keep it?"
Xander shrugged - took another drink. "I dunno. I just... It was different. *It was you. It was my last link with...older things. It's like something Giles would do or Willow, it's...*
"Regret," Spike said softly, and Xander nodded. Regret. Exactly. Spike lifted the journal and undid the bindings on it - began to leaf through it, walking slowly toward Xander. Xander took another drink, watching him.
Spike shook his head, laughing softly. "This is worse than that bloody idiot Castaneda. What babble." Spike touched a page of words that seemed to have been written in blood. Xander wondered if it had been his own, or someone else's.
"All mine, mate. No worries there."
"That's really freaking me out, man."
Spike's gaze darted up to Xander's, a flashing glance of amusement and glee. "Doesn't work on everybody. Thank Christ - can you imagine the inane prattle I'd be forced to listen to in clubs? No..." Spike crouched down, leafing to the very end of the journal and staring for a long moment at the sketch of the dead woman. "It only works sometimes." He reached out and settled the journal on the burning logs, balancing it carefully. The tattered edges of the clippings fluttered in the heat and then began to curl and blacken. Spike rubbed his hand on his thigh and stood up.
Xander stared down at the fire - at the journal. At the death-locked stare of the woman, watching her flayed skin and the bright skein of blood under her jaw blacken and crumble. "So - what makes it work?"
"Not sure, really," Spike said. He sent his cigarette butt after the journal and then turned to Xander, toe to toe, nearly touching. "I just know it has to be someone...special."
"Special how?" Xander asked.
"Shut up," Spike whispered. He leaned forward the few inches between them, his eyes going half-lidded and dark. Drawing in a long breath through his mouth, his fingers curling slowly around Xander's wrists. Xander felt the bottle slip out of his hand - bump knee and shin and clunk unharmed to the wooden floor, rolling away. Leaving an arc of liquid behind as it rolled, golden with reflected flame.
It hurt like it had the first time, lying under mosquito netting and a black-haired South African boy, biting his lip until it bled. Evan had stopped instantly, letting out a small sound of distress - waiting while Xander pried his hands open, nails sunk into Evan's skin. Waited for it to be good again.
Spike only pushed harder, his head dipping down and his tongue - cool and agile - slipping along Xander's lip, gathering the blood into his own mouth. Sucking gently while Xander struggled fruitlessly under him and then gave up, panting.
"Sspike -"
"Push against me," Spike murmured, his tongue busy elsewhere now and Xander pushed, legs trembling. Pushed and gasped in a hard, hitching breath as Spike breached him fully - slid in. Hot rush of cool flesh, the burn going up the backs of Xander's legs and twisting into his belly - plucking at his balls.
"Christ, that's lovely..." Spike said, breathy whisper in Xander's ear, his forearms under Xander's shoulders, his fingers tight in Xander's hair. Straining his head back, chin to the ceiling and Spike's mouth lapping and nibbling and sucking here, there, there.
Xander shuddered, groaning softly - dug his heel into the back of Spike's thigh and pushed, pushed, pushed - lifted his hips and dragged his hands down Spike's back, fingernails catching on every swell of vertebrae. "Spike - Jesus -" Spike's shoulder was right there, curve of skin that glowed in the firelight like mother of pearl. Finer than a human's skin - poreless and perfect and Xander craned his head down and bit, hard.
"Fuck - yeah..." Spike's hips jerked forward and Xander's whole body locked tight as he rode the wave of burning, shuddering ache.
"Just - lemme - Spike, wait -" Xander clawed at Spike's back but Spike only arched like a Halloween tom, his gaze meeting Xander's all pumpkin-gold and feral, lips snarling back from needle-pointed fangs.
"Too late," Spike growled, lifting and pulling and then pushing back in, harder and faster and twist of hips right there, right there and Xander sucked in oxygen gone rare and bright-edged, keening. There was an oval of red on Spike's perfect shoulder and Xander focused on it - traced the indentations of his teeth and let his hands slide lower - let them cup and then squeeze the dense, flexing muscle.
"Why'd you - c-come back?" Xander asked, and Spike tugged at his hair - pushed Xander's chin up again with a nudge of his cheek.
"Junkie, aren't I? Can't get enough." Spike's voice was amused - slightly breathless - and his fangs slid in easily, two slim wands of burning ice. The fire was white-gold-scarlet in the edges of Xander's vision, dancing and growing as he opened wide - eyes, mouth, thighs - to Spike. As he shuddered, spitted and arched and writhing, to a bone-wringing orgasm.
When the room blinked back from nuclear-white to saffron-glow and the low murmur of the fire, Spike was still on him - in him. Moving with the slow undulation of a snake, heavy and cool and totally inescapable. Xander's legs were sprawled, bent and heavy and too weak to move. Xander let his head roll to the side as Spike lapped at his throat, thorough cleaning of a mother cat.
"M'not a cat," Spike grumbled.
"What's that?" Xander asked, letting his hand slide off Spike's back and flop limply on the floor. Flopped in the general direction of the slim, silver flask that was slipping out of Spike's coat pocket.
"Mmm? Oh. That's something Dru made up, just for you." Spike shifted, pushing himself up - kneeling back, shifting Xander's hips up onto his thighs. "Hold on, now, Xander. Hold tight."
Xander flexed his hips and thighs, watching Spike's eyes flutter, his head going back. Spike grinned down at him, all curious angles and planes - red between his fangs. "Thought Dru left."
"Eventually," Spike said. He stretched for the flask and Xander sighed, his own eyes closing at the press and rub of Spike's cock on sensitized flesh. "But not before she left me this little...aperitif, you might say."
"I doubt I'd say it."
Spike ignored him - unscrewed the lid and took a delicate sniff. Then he put his hand around the back of Xander's neck and hauled him upright, settling him onto cock and thighs with casual strength. Xander whimpered, bracing his forearms on Spike's shoulders, his head heavy on his neck.
"What the - fuck -"
"Just a little something from her to you. Drink up, now."
The flask's edge was cool and it tasted of iron and Xander ducked away, grimacing. Spike's fingers dug in on either side of his spine, pinching hard and Xander arched away from the stabbing pain and then froze as Spike shook him a little.
"Don't fucking fight me, Xander. Drink it. Won't hurt you."
Xander batted weakly at the flask - yelped when Spike pinched even harder, everything going blood-red for a moment as needling heat raced down his spine. And through his cock. *Fuck, fuck - oh god, that's - fucking sick it's - good, so damn -*
"Always knew you were a kinky bugger," Spike murmured, his voice delighted and a little cracked and Xander ground their bodies together, gasping for air.
"Don't, just - Spike -"
"Drink it." Spike pushed the flask against Xander's mouth again, tipping it, and fluid spilled out and sluiced into Xander's mouth. Thick and cold and slippery, tasting of vinegar and salt and citrus. Tasting of earth and rot and Xander tried to gag - tried to spit it out. But Spike's hand was on his chin now, holding his mouth shut. Arm around his back and fingertips just stroking his throat and Xander twisted and choked and swallowed, shuddering. The fluid snaked down his throat and into his belly and he could feel it uncoiling there, like a knot of worms going free. Spike let his chin go and Xander worked his tongue through the dregs.
"What the - what the fuck - god -"
"Oh, good, good kitty." Spike looked delighted. He pushed Xander over with a thump, following him down and getting one of Xander's thighs up over his shoulder, spreading Xander wide under him - crushing him small. "That was bloody marvelous, I could feel you -"
"Shut up, Spike." Xander couldn't seem to make his hands work - his arms. He lay like a ragdoll, watching Spike rock over him, the firelight flickering and dimming as if the fire were guttering out. "What'd you - what's it d-doing? What -"
"Just killing you, Xander, that's all. Just a poison Dru found. Bane and blackest magic to gut that bloody baba yaga's spell."
Xander writhed mutely, the icy worms creeping out and out from his gut - invading every limb. Constricting around his spine and lungs and heart. He could hear his breathe wheezing in his throat - could feel his fingers and toes curling tight. When Spike's wrist, gashed with scarlet, was pressed to his mouth he couldn't fight - couldn't move. He felt Spike's fingers stroking again, over and over so that he swallowed. Spike's blood tasted like woodsmoke and honey.
"Just swallow it down, then. Just a little medicine to make you all better." Spike's eyes seemed to glow - grow - bright as the sun. Hammered gold slitted with black, and Xander felt himself falling into that black. Felt, distantly, Spike moving in him again, faster and harder. He tried to stop his gliding drop into that vast darkness but his fingers were numb and useless - his lungs breathless. "All better," Spike crooned softly, and Xander felt Spike's tongue at the corner of his mouth as Spike's wrist slipped away. "Spoonful of sugar soon, then you'll be right as rain."
*Rain, rain, go away...can you hear me, Spike?*
"I hear you. Shhh...go to sleep." Xander tried to shake his head but he couldn't feel himself anymore - couldn't see, couldn't hear. Sleep...seemed like the best thing, and he let it come. It was cold.
ETA: Uh, guys. By 'crafting' i meant serious working on the fic! Not bird houses made out of popsicle sticks. Just thought i'd...clear that up.
*cough*
Continued here.
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Thanks for being brave and reading!
*pet pet*
Yes, xover!