full 3/4 1/2   skin light dark       
 
The Wind Beneath My Wings by slaymesoftly
 
Two
 
<<     >>
 

Chapter Two

She was especially attentive to Angel during the meal, trying to make up for both her lack of affection earlier and for the way she had hurt him when she grabbed his arm. It was still hard for her to remember sometimes that he was now an ordinary human man and that she could not treat his body the way she had when it was almost as strong as hers. He sometimes reminded her of Riley - insisting on sparring with her, only to become angry when she was able to handle him without breaking a sweat. Eventually, for the sake of their relationship, they had agreed that Buffy would only spar with other slayers and that Angel would work out with either the newer slayers or with some of the younger, more physically fit watchers.

The remainder of the meal went well, with the four humans chatting about old times and activities. If Spike’s name came up more often than he might have liked, Angel managed to keep an interested look on his face and to smile at appropriate times. He couldn’t hide his surprise when Xander and Willow laughed about finding a humiliated Spike, clad in Xander’s old clothes, trying to stake himself in the Harris basement.

“That doesn’t sound like Spike!” he interrupted. “He never, ever gives up.”

“Oh, I don’t think he was really trying to do it,” Willow hastened to say. “He was just feeling sorry for himself. If he really wanted to kill himself he could have just walked outside.”

“Or, he could have asked me to do it,” Buffy agreed wryly. “Trust me, at that time in our lives, I would have been happy to help him out.”

“Oh, I don’t know, Buff,” Xander teased gently. “I remember a lot of groping and kissing during Willow’s little spell. You really think you could have knocked off your ex-fiancé?”

“Your what?” Angel’s outraged roar made it clear that he had never been told about the spell that had the two blonds thinking they were getting married.

“It was nothing, Angel.” Buffy rolled her eyes. “A spell. When we still hated each other. We fought the whole time.”

She resolutely pushed back the memories of a skull ring that she’d kept in a jewelry box now buried under a pile of rubble in the California desert. At the time she’d not been sure she would ever have a normal engagement or marriage and she somehow couldn’t bring herself to throw away the symbol of the short time when someone had wanted to marry her.

(Somebody wants to marry me now. Somebody IS going to marry me. Tomorrow. I’m getting married tomorrow. To the love of my life. Okay, maybe not so much the love of my life anymore, but somebody I love. Who loves me.)

Angel subsided into muttered grumbling about vampires that didn’t know their place and witches who should be more careful with their spells until Willow finally leaned across the table to remind him that the witch in question was her, and that she was now powerful enough to turn him into a bug with a flick of her finger. While Buffy and Xander tried to hide their smiles, the redhead continued to glare at Angel until he mumbled an apology and sat back to brood quietly. The three friends immediately went back to reminiscing about the old days before Sunnydale fell into the Hellmouth.

During dessert, a small combo walked out onto the tiny stage and began to warm up their instruments. They were soon joined by a petite brunette who walked to the microphone and smiled out at the audience. She waited for the dinner table chatter to die down enough that she was sure she could be heard and then said with another smile, “We are beginning tonight with a request for a particular song. Apparently we have someone in the building tonight who is getting married tomorrow and just in case they won’t be playing this song at your wedding, here it is now.”

The band went into the introduction and the girl swayed with the music until she was ready to begin. She stepped back to the microphone and began, “It must have been cold there, in my shadow…”




Buffy’s face went white as a sheet, as did Willow’s, once the memories came flooding back. As the singer went on, oblivious to the effect upon her intended audience, a hissed conversation was taking place at the table. While Angel looked on in bewilderment, Willow was rapidly defending herself to Buffy, insisting that she never had, would never think of, and had no idea how the band even knew Buffy was there. Xander frowned at them, as bewildered as Angel, until a random memory from almost eight years ago wormed its way out of his subconscious and he remembered who had told them that Buffy wanted to hear “The Wind Beneath My Wings” at her wedding.

Angel’s anger continued to grow as it became obvious that not only was the song clearly intended for Buffy, but that it was more than just a favorite song. Finally, sounding much like his old, unsouled and non-human self, he growled, “Is anyone going to tell me what’s going on? If you wanted to hear this song tomorrow, Buffy, all you had to do was say so. ‘The whole program doesn’t have to be Barry Manilow songs.”

Buffy ignored him, frantically searching the room with both her eyes and her slayer senses. Angel’s repeated question as to whether she wanted the song played at their wedding brought a resounding “No!” from the slayer and her two equally perturbed companions. As the song ended and the girl on the stage nodded towards Buffy and asked the audience to “congratulate the happy couple”, Buffy did her best to appear embarrassed but happy and Angel waved weakly. As soon as the attention was off their table and the band had gone on to other, less stressful, music, she turned to her intended husband and seemingly changed the subject.

“Tell us again about that battle with the Senior Partners, Angel. I don’t think Xander has actually heard about it.”

Xander’s attempt to say that he had, earned him a hard kick from Willow and he swallowed the words, nodding and agreeing, “Oh yeah, formerly-Deadboy, I want to hear about how you pissed your bosses off so much they threw a whole army at you. Not to mention how you managed to live through it and come out smelling like a rose. So to speak.”

Something about the familiar resentment in Xander’s voice allowed the big man to relax and he leaned forward to talk about the epic battle against an army of demons and a dragon. A battle that he had gone into as a 200-year-old vampire and had come out of a human man, the same age as when he had been turned. He talked about losing Wes and Gunn early on, and about how he and Spike and Illyria had walked into the alley to face the incoming army from hell.


His story centered primarily, of course, upon his own fighting as he admitted that things were too fast and furious for him to know exactly what was going on with his two companions.

“I think Illyria was using some of her time-bending tricks - I remember seeing everything around her moving in slow motion one time. Of course Spike just charged right in, fangs and fists flying. It’s a wonder he didn’t get taken out right away, as dumb as he was.”

From the corner of his eye, he saw Buffy’s eyes narrow and he hastened to add, “But brave. He was always brave. Foolishly so.”

“So, Deadboy,” Xander attempted to get Angel back on track. “How did the whole Shanshu thing work? And how the hell did a human get out of that mess alive?”

Angel shifted uncomfortably in his chair, shooting a look at Buffy before he admitted, “The dragon – did I mention there was a dragon? Anyway, I wanted to fight it and Spike kept getting in the way, so I ran around and jumped on its back. It leaped into the air and sort of…bucked me off. When I hit the ground, I was not really conscious for a few seconds and I was just laying there while the dragon got ready to fry me…” His eyes glazed over for a minute, clearly remembering the sensation of being at the mercy of a fire-breathing beast. He shook himself out of his memories and continued with an apologetic shrug.

“Anyway, I’m lying there thinking that as soon as that beast breathes on me, I’m a goner, when I realized that I could feel my heart pounding. And that I was choking on the fumes from the dragon’s breath. I looked up and Spike was just standing there, staring at me.”

“And then what?” Willow prompted. “How did you get away?”

Angel took another look at Buffy, who was listening impassively, having already heard most of this before. He took her limp hand in his and continued.

“I heard Spike say, ‘Bloody hell!’ and then he jumped on the dragon and jerked its head away from me so that the fire went just past my head and into the side of the building. It blew the wall apart and a brick fell on my head, knocking me out again. When I woke up, I was the only one in the alley. Even the demon bodies were gone.”

“So, you didn’t see Spike dust?” Buffy attempted to keep her voice casual and even, trying not to crush Angel’s large hand, which was still holding hers. In his first description of the battle and his shanshu, he had implied that he’d watched both Spike and Illyria disappear.

Rather than extricating himself from her, Angel brought his other hand around and cradled her small one between his.

“He’s gone, Buffy. There is no way that they survived that army unless Illyria was somehow able to teleport them into another dimension. Either way, he’s gone.”

“Did you look for him?” she asked, still maintaining an even tone and allowing him to caress her hand. “Did you see his dust?”

He sighed, releasing her. “Even dead, he’s going to be a pain in my ass, isn’t he?” he grumbled before answering her question. “Buffy, the alley was a mess; it was full of dirt and dust and blood and puddles of rain – and I was newly human, wounded and very, very tired and confused. I didn’t look. When I got knocked out, he was wrestling a fire-breathing dragon – I had no reason to think I was going to find him – or his dust. It’s not like he wouldn’t have come looking for you if he survived it, you know.”

“He knew you were human, didn’t he?” Her face gave no indication of what she was thinking, but Willow gave a small gasp, as she understood what Buffy was getting at.

“Yes. I’m sure he did. I could see it in his eyes, just before he—“

“Just before he saved your life,” she finished for him tonelessly, gently pulling her hand out of his. “He saw that you were human, he saved your life and when you woke up, he was gone. And you didn’t look for him.”

The man looked at his fiancée and her two friends, all now staring at him with what seemed to be accusation.

“I. Had. No. Choice,” he ground out. “I was unconscious. I don’t know what happened while I was out – I just know they were gone. I’m sorry I can’t tell you how he died, or where his dust is, but it really isn’t something I want to be arguing about the night before our wedding.”

“Me neither, Angel,” she agreed suddenly. “Why don’t we all just go on back to the hotel? I still have some things to do tonight.”

Relieved that the subject of his interfering grandchilde had been dropped, Angel readily agreed and waved the waitress over for the check. While he was waiting for his card to be returned, Buffy excused herself to go to the ladies room. Willow rose to her feet, intending to accompany the slayer, but sat again at a small shake of Buffy’s head.

Once away from the table, Buffy shut her eyes and extended her senses until she once again picked up the unmistakable vampire tingles. She followed them as far as a fire exit, stopping when she saw it fall shut behind whomever had just left the building. With a muffled curse, she turned and stalked back to the table, grabbing her purse and waiting impatiently for the others to get to their feet.


 
<<     >>